


My Brother's Boyfriend is a Monster

by zeerogue



Series: My Brother's Boyfriend is a Monster [1]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Written in 2012, but kailu is the main pairing, kailu - Freeform, lukai - Freeform, other pairings but those are spoilers, sehun is the main character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-13
Updated: 2017-05-14
Packaged: 2018-10-31 06:44:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 76,928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10893888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zeerogue/pseuds/zeerogue
Summary: SeHun was content with having no friends as long as his older half brother, Luhan, was around until he met Kim Jongin. Then Jongin met Luhan. With his relationship with his beloved brother threatened, Sehun will stop at nothing to convince his brother that the boy he once called his friend is nothing but a liar, manipulator, and monster.





	1. In Which I Meet Kim Jongin

**My Brother’s Boyfriend Is a Monster**

 

**Chapter 1 – In Which I Meet Kim Jongin**

 

 

The older students always said high school would be fun, but they were all just sadistic liars wanting to get some enjoyment out of their lives by watching the new kids slowly get eaten alive by studies and homework and the hours spent in one room with twenty other hostile teenagers. I didn’t know of one classmate who wanted to be back in school rather than spending even one more day on summer break. But, there was always one thing you could find in school that was enjoyable.

 

Looking around the halls of school on my first day back from the two month break I guessed the one thing most students enjoyed about school was being with their friends. Groups huddled together in the hall, and in the classrooms they piled up on the desks showing off pictures on their phones of things they did over the break. I shifted my bag and walked past them all, walking to class 1-K. Inside, I took the path behind the teacher’s desk, making an arc to the last row of desks. I lifted my feet higher than normal incase there were careless legs sticking out from the desks or someone thought it would be funny to trip someone and kept my attention forward. I sat in the second desk to the end on the left side of the room and slipped my notebook out, already opened to a fresh page and tapped a pencil on the clean white sheet as I looked out the large window beside me until class started.

 

For me, the one thing I enjoyed about school was this, this desk. No one sat behind me, so there wasn’t the annoying presence there yet my back did not feel completely exposed and since no one sat there, the teachers tended not to glance this way often so I never had to worry about being called on when I didn’t want to. But the best was on sunny days like this, the sun shone down perfectly on my seat no matter where it was in the sky and it felt warm on my pale skin. I could close my eyes and nap away the hours without getting caught in lessons I found boring.

 

The teacher took longer than usual getting to class that day. She was always late, but when I finally looked away from the window and at the clock in the back of the classroom, it was already fifteen minutes into class and everyone was still sitting on their desks and chatting. I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms with a sigh. I had wanted to nap, but unless there was class going on, it was always so loud. The teacher needed to hurry up.

 

After another three minutes, the door to the classroom finally opened. There was only a hand though, but we could hear the teacher talking out in the hall to someone and the kids on the tables took that chance to take a proper seat. She finally walked in, smiling at us as she went to the desk in the front and repositioned her glasses.

 

“Good morning class, aren’t you all glad to be back at school?” she asked only getting groans in return. “Of course you’re not, but perhaps this will cheer you up. We have a transfer student.” She turned to the cracked open door. “You can come in now.”

 

Another hand appeared in the room followed by a tall form of a boy. He walked with rhythmic strides to stand beside the teacher’s desk. Though he looked ever bit like a typical Korean from the eye shape and the dark hair, his thick lips and tanned skin made me wonder if he was mixed. And there was something else about him, just the way he held himself and fit our yellow school uniform. I looked around the classroom to see the other students’ reactions. The girls were all smiling with their heads in their hands staring at him and the boys looked curious.

 

Of course, I thought, he’s a flower boy.

 

Not that there weren’t others. Even I was called so when attention was brought to me, but I was kind of like a ghost. I floated around school just trying to get through the day. I liked it that way, not having to deal with my peers or the teachers. However, the new student didn’t seem that way.

 

“Please introduce yourself.”

 

The boy moved his shoulders, shifting his backpack around and scanned the class. “I’m Kim Jongin, but you can call me Kai. I moved here from France with my family. Please take care of me and let’s get along.”

 

His voice was deeper than I expected and his face didn’t seem to really change as he talked, just stayed blank and uninterested. Kai, what was that about? He had said he just came from France, maybe he really was mixed and that was his given name. Not like I really cared that much. I went back to looking outside the window now that he was done introducing himself.

 

“Yes, we’ll make sure to make you feel welcomed. Please take that empty seat behind Mr. Oh there. Oh Sehun, raise your hand,” the teacher said.

 

Of course the new student would be sat behind me. It was the only empty seat in the classroom. I took a moment to mourn my peaceful school days and sighed before lifting my hand. There went my days of being unnoticed. The teacher would definitely call on this guy and the students would look back at him or crowd around his desk in the morning and during breaks to ask him about France. I could already see it all now, me pressed against the window as to not accidentally lift up one of the girls’ short skirt with my elbows as they backed their bottoms into my space. How annoying! I’d have to start coming to school later and find a different place to sit during breaks.

 

The new student bowed and walked down the last row. I glanced at him as he passed; judging him to see what a Korean from France would be like. His face was mostly blank until his eyes met mine and then he sent a friendly smile and disappeared in the seat behind me.

 

**형**

 

Just as I had predicted, when break rolled around, everyone flocked to the new student’s desk. I didn’t even have a chance to get out of my seat and find some place to peacefully waste the next fifteen minutes before there were girls sliding into the spaced between his desk and mine. I piled my books on my desk to keep them from sitting on it and leaned as far forward as I could, keeping my face away. They’d start talking to me, too, if I looked any of them in the eye. I had learned that on our first day.

 

“Did you really live in France before?” one girl asked. “What was it like there?”

 

“Um, it was kind of stressful,” the new kid answered, low voice dripping uncomfortableness. I smirked.

 

“Oh, was it because you didn’t speak the language well? Were you bullied?”

 

“No, the bus drivers were just always on strike. We ended up just driving my brother’s Ferrari.”

 

A Ferrari? One of those expensive European cars? Was he a stuck up rich kid; we didn’t have any of those kids in our school, Maybe now we did.

 

“You have brothers?” a male student asked.

 

“Yeah, I have…” he paused for a minute and I took a glance at his reflection in the mirror to see him counting on his fingers. “I have six older brothers.”

 

“Wow, so many. Are they all as handsome as you?” a girl flirted.

 

I saw the new kid grin a bit to himself and shrug. “We all have our own charms.”

 

We all have our own charms, was that some polite way of saying he thought he was the best looking? I was glad when the bell rang for class to start again. Of course it ended way too soon. I groaned and lifted my head from where it laid against the window and looked around. Everyone was leaving class, most of them with bento boxes in their hands, heading to eat outside or in the cafeteria.

 

“Hey, are you going to nap here? It’s lunch time.”

 

I groaned and turned my head to the voice that addressed me. The new kid was looking at me with curious dark eyes, his face too close to mine and a hand on my shoulder. I moved away and stood up, grabbing my wallet from my bag before I headed out of the class.

 

“Hey, wait up,” the new kid said.

 

I took faster steps not wanting him to think just because I sat in front of him that he had to hang out with me or that I was inclined to show him around. All I wanted to do was get some lunch and go find my usual table in the cafeteria to eat at. By the time I got in line, most of the good food was gone and I had to settle for some weird brown glop and rice. There was still a lot of milk and I grabbed to cartons before looking around.

 

In the corner of the cafeteria close to the trashcans was a small table that most people didn’t bother sitting at. Most of the seats were broken and it wiggled back and forth with the slightest movement. It probably was pushed over away from the other tables because it wasn’t supposed to be used, but since I always sat there, the janitors had just left it. I sat down on one of the still intact seats and cautiously tasted the brown glop. It wasn’t bad, and if it made me sick then I just had an excuse not to come to school the next day. Before I could get a second taste of it though, I saw someone take a seat beside me. I turned my head only to be faced with the side view of the new student.

 

He had a large bento box wrapped in a pink polka dotted napkin. Gently, he tugged on the little ears and took off the lid to reveal lines and lines of meat, most of it fried chicken, with a small side of rice and vegetables. I stared at it with aw, my mouth watering. Surely he couldn’t eat that all, maybe if I asked he would share…but I didn’t want him to share, I didn’t even want him sitting there.

 

“What are you doing?”

 

The new student looked at me, a drumstick halfway to his mouth. “I’m eating lunch.”

 

“Yes, but why are you eating lunch here?” I asked.

 

He cocked his head to the side looking like a confused cat. “Am I not allowed to?”

 

Well, it wasn’t like he couldn’t, but why would he want to.

 

“Oh, the seat is taken already, I should have asked first then.” He stuck the drumstick in his mouth and started to gather up his food.

 

“It’s not taken,” I said and regretted it when his dark eyes shone.

 

“If it’s not, then can I sit here?”

 

I shrugged. Even if I did want to be left by myself, I wasn’t rude enough to straight out tell him I did not want him eating with me. Just for today until he made friends.

 

“Go ahead.”

 

He got comfortable in his seat again. He ate prettily, I noted, but quickly. A whole drumstick was gone within seconds yet there were no crumbs on his full lips.

 

“So is anyone else coming to sit here?”

 

The sudden movement of his lips brought my attention back and I realized I had been staring. “No, no one else sits here.”

 

“You sit by yourself then? You don’t have any friends?”

 

I poked at the brown glop. It had started to stiffen and I made a face at it. “It’s not that I don’t have any, I just don’t want any.”

 

“I figured it had to be something like that. You are a good looking guy so I don’t think people would avoid you,” he said. “Too bad though, I like your standoffishness, so let’s be friends.”

 

I raised an eyebrow at him. This guy wasn’t serious? He seemed like he could be really popular and have his choice of any seat. And if he wanted to be alone, there were other empty places he could go to eat.

 

“What if I reject?’”

 

He looked from my plate to his bento box and back. He lifted his chopsticks and began to place bits of his food onto my plate watching my expression. With ever morsel added, I could feel my lips twitch and saliva collect in my mouth.

 

“You’re smiling,” he pointed.

 

I popped one of the meat morsels into my mouth and enjoyed the sweet and salty tang of it on my mouth. “Fine, you win, Jongin was it?”

 

“Call me Kai, and you’re Sehun.” The new student, Kai, reached his hand out and I put mine out as well. He didn’t shake it like I thought he would, just a simple firm American style hand shake. Kai held onto my thumb, his elbow at an angle, our hands fisted together – a bonding sort of handshake, a special handshake between friends.

 

**형**

 

It was supper time when I finally got home, school ending late that day and then I had dance practice after. Kai had gone with me. After getting caught dancing along in the corner, he decided to join with a little persuasion from the dance teacher. He had stuck to me the whole day like a stray animal you feed once. It was unnerving at first, the other students always stared at him and because he was talking to me, they would stare at me as well. Fewer and fewer curious students approached him though, once they saw him talking to me. I guessed that was the reason he had approached me in the first place with the offer of being friends, a sort of shield to annoying questions.

 

Two introverts teaming up seemed like a good compromise to have instead of having my desk at school bombarded with girls trying to talk him up.

 

“Sehun, are you home?”

 

I slipped off my shoes just inside the door placing them next to the slightly smaller pair already there and started for the stairs of our small two story apartment. “Yeah, hyung, I just got back, practice ran long. I’m going to go put my bag away.”

 

There were two bedrooms on the top floor, mine and then my older half brother’s. I threw my bag carelessly onto my bed and pulled off the yellow jacket of my uniform and blouse, heading down the stairs in just my slacks and under shirt. The living room, kitchen, and bathroom were downstairs. I stopped in the doorway of the small kitchen and saw the thin but tall frame of my hyung at the sink and walked up behind him. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and dumped all my weight onto him.

 

“Hyung, is supper ready?” I asked.

 

“I ordered stew; it should be here any moment now.”

 

“You didn’t try to cook anything?” I peaked around his mass of fluffy light brown hair to see his expression.

 

His round nose scrunched up like a rabbit’s and he shifted. “I tried to, but you know how that always comes out.”

 

“Hyung~,” I began, but the doorbell rang and I was sent to retrieve the delivery.

 

It had been fives years since I first met Lu Han, my older brother. I had always known about him, his face took up the desktop background of our mother’s computer for as long as I could remember. He was result of our mother’s rendezvous in China during her college days. He had been raised by his Chinese grandmother, the details of why I had never been sure of. When Lu Han’s grandmother got too old, he came to live with us. I was confused when I saw him for the first time. Though four years older, if it had not been for the middle school uniform and being taller than me at the time, I would have thought we were the same age. His face looked the same from the ones our mother showed me on the days she would take out the photo album of pictures his grandmother sent.

 

There was also a time a few months into our first meeting I was convinced he was actually my sister. Lu Han has never been weak, but he doesn’t like trouble. Being Chinese and not perfect in Korean got him in trouble with some of the neighbor kids. His hair was a bit long then and the insults they threw at him did not help with my delusions, but they did help to build up my distaste for other people. I always ran out to try to protect my hyung. It did not look good to beat up a foreigner and an elementary school kid, so they usually left him alone and I started walking my brother to and from school until last year when he graduated.

 

I paid the delivery man and brought the tub of food into the kitchen and put it on the bar. “You should really learn to cook, hyung. We’re going to run out of funds for the month if we keep eating take out.”

 

“It’s not that expensive,” Lu Han said and took off the lid of the tub to dig out our food. “Besides, if we do, I’ll just get you to aeygo us some more cash out of your dad.”

 

“Or you could just get a job.”

 

Lu Han snapped his chopsticks over my head and I rubbed the top of it, glaring at him. “Why’d you do that for?”

 

“You’re a hundred years too early to be telling me what to do,” Lu Han said as he ripped the plastic off the bowls of rice and stew and began stuffing it into his mouth. “I refuse to let my grades go down because of work.”

 

“How can your grades go down? All you do is take pictures, dance, and sing.”

 

Lu Han glared at me over the top of his bowl. “Do I have to hit you with the chopsticks again?”

 

I held my hands out in defeat and ripped the plastic off my own bowl of stew and rice, taking a seat on one of the stools on the bar in the kitchen.

 

Lu Han put his bowl back down on the table and leaned forward. His large eyes twinkled at me and I leaned back, eating my rice with suspicion.

 

“You seem different today, more playful. Did something interesting happen?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Not really. We just got a new kid.”

 

Lu Han tapped his spoon to his lips thoughtfully. “A new student, I guess that’s not too rare this time of year. Well, tell me about him.”

 

“Do I have to?” I groaned. My brother was like those other kids at school, always wanting to know everything about anything new that popped up. I liked him wanting to hear stuff about my life, but there wasn’t much to my life and I just had this feeling that I didn’t want to tell him about Kai.

 

“Yes, tell me. I was a new student once, I can sympathize.”

 

I didn’t want him to sympathize or have any or kind of feeling to some random kid. “Fine, um, his name is Kim Jongin, but he likes to be called Kai.”

 

“Kai, it sounds Japanese.”

 

I shrugged. “He said he moved from France.”

 

“Oh, so he’s a foreigner, that’s got to be tough.”

 

I shook my head. “He’s Korean, a little tan though.”

 

“Not everyone’s as white as you, Sehun. It’s probably from being on the French beaches. I hear they have nude beaches in France.”

 

I poked at my rice. “I don’t really care for nude beaches.”

 

“Neither do I, that’ is what we have in common, little brother.” He reached out and ruffled my hair and I swatted his hand away. 

 

“I never said I had our interests, hyung. He said he had a lot of brothers, six I think.”

 

“Older or younger?”

 

“Older. He talked about them, but I wasn’t really listening.”

 

“Oh, you mean you actually had a discussion with someone at school? I thought you had deemed everyone unworthy of your voice,” Lu Han teased and started to pick at the side dishes.

 

“Hey, stop making me sound like a narcissist. I just don’t like kids my age, they’re stupid and immature.”

 

“So you don’t like kids that are like you,” Lu Han laughed.

 

“Yah, hyung, if you want to hear more about him then stop it.”

 

Lu Han held his hands in front of him in surrender. “Go on; tell me about your new friend.”

 

“He’s not…” I was going to say he wasn’t my friend, but then I remembered our agreement. “Okay, yeah he’s my friend. I didn’t really listen to a lot of what he was saying, I’ll listen more tomorrow, but he joined the dance club. He’s actually really good. I think he mentioned something about having taken ballet before.”

 

“Oh, well now I can’t wait until your next performance to see it, or maybe you could invite him over one day. I’d love to take pictures of a ballerina.”

 

“He’s not coming over, our friendship is just a mutual agreement,” I said and plopped my dirty bowl on top of my brother’s.

 

He stacked the dirty dishes into the tub and walked over to the fridge. “I’ll believe that if in a month you don’t start asking to stay out later to hang out with him.”

 

Like that would happen. There were very few things in the world that could keep me from wanting to come home as long as Lu Han was here. “I doubt it very much, hyung. I’m going to do my homework now,” I said and turned in my seat to head up to my room.

 

“Hold it, you forgot something,” Lu Han said.

 

I turned with a groan and walked around the counter. “How long are you going to make me keep doing this, hyung, I’m already fifteen?”

 

“I will make you do it as long as you are still my little brother.”

 

I leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to my brother’s cheek. Lu Han laughed and patted the top of my head.

 

“Silly little brother, you did forget to kiss your brother welcome home, but I meant that.” He pointed and I followed his finger to the tub of dirty dishes. “Take that out into the hall.”

 

My shoulders slumped and I grabbed the tub. “Yes hyung.”


	2. And Then He Meets My Brother

**Chapter 2 – And Then He Meets My Brother**

 

 

 

Somehow, a week went by and then two and Kai still sat with me at lunch on what had become _our_ broken lunch table near the garbage cans in the cafeteria. After the first week, other students had stopped attempting to come up to him with personal questions, though some of the more persistent girls still found something relevant to school to ask him on occasion. Usually, though, he deflected others by asking me tons of questions during class about my life. At first I just gave general information as he didn’t seem genuinely interested in what I had to say, usually texting one of his brothers or playing a game on his phone, but I guess I eventually said something that sparked his interest and he began to actually listen.

 

It was weird having someone interested in my life. Sure, when I first came to this school at the beginning of the year with the rest of the first years, there had been people that flocked to me. I wasn’t bad looking, and was some what of an amateur model being my brother’s main subject of interest when it came to photography, so he often posted pictures of us and his friends on his website which Lu Han boasted about on a weekly basis. But it was all superficial attention and I hated superficial and everyone was superficial. I could only stand Lu Han because he was my brother and I had to protect him and love him. But, Kai didn’t seem so superficial, or maybe his superficialness was just misunderstood.   

 

“You know, they’re going to start talking bad about you if you don’t at least go out with other kids when they invite you,” I said to Kai one day as we sat at our lunch table.

 

He paused in prettily stuffing his mouth with his large lunch of meat to respond. “I’m hanging with you, why would I want to hang with them.”

 

I poked at my overcooked rice and the yellow muck the cafeteria had cooked that day. “Hanging with me isn’t going to give you a bad reputation, but it’s not going to get you a good one either.”

 

“I don’t really care about reputation,” he said and took a big bite off from a chicken skewer. He chewed for a while before wrapping an arm around my shoulders. “We’re both kindred spirits, aren’t we? You can feel that right, our similarities.”

 

I pushed Kai’s arm off my shoulder and glared at him. Similarities, what similarities did we have? We were close to the same age, in the same grade; we both liked dancing and from what I had observed, didn’t like people too much. Introverts, okay maybe we were both introverts but that was it.

 

I looked at Kai blankly. “I absolutely don’t understand what you are talking about, Kim Jongin.”

 

Kai grinned at me and started to pile meat onto my plate from his lunchbox. He seemed to do that a lot, give me food, and it was usually when I started to get frustrated with what he was talking about. I stared at the juicy meats, already knowing they would be delicious from the past two weeks of being fed them.

 

“We’re kindred souls. It was just something I thought since the first time I saw you and you didn’t seem interested in me.”

 

“You were interested in me because I wasn’t interested in you?” I asked. It sounded stupid.

 

Kai shook his head. “I wasn’t interested in you. All I have to do is get through school. I’m not interested in it at all and I’m not interested in people.”

 

“What are you interested in?” I couldn’t help but ask.

 

He looked thoughtful for a while and a smile spread across his face. “Dancing, I’m interested in dancing and music and just work in general – artsy work.”

 

He did love dancing; I had seen that the first time we practiced together. We stayed after class so I could help catch him up on the dance we were learning. It was just us two in the room facing the same mirror and only a couple steps in, I had to stop. I just stood there and watched his reflection in the mirror. It was like he wasn’t even human, as if he was made of music himself. When there wasn’t anymore choreography, he didn’t stop, he continued, making the music flow with him.

 

 I enjoyed dancing; second to my seat in the classroom, going to dance practice was one of the things that made coming to school worth it. But I had had trouble getting the image of Kai dancing out of my head. Never before had I really taken it too seriously, it was just something I enjoyed doing and that took up my time so I wouldn’t have to be home alone until my brother got back from college, but, every time that image popped into my head I thought ‘Wow, I want to be like that’. Maybe that was why I was willing to tell Kai about me, why I sort of wanted him to stay around. That and he fed me.

 

“Is that all? You don’t dislike all people, do you, you don’t seem the type,” I said.

 

“I didn’t think you seemed like the assuming type,” Kai said and grinned.

 

I glared back. “You know what I mean.”

 

He shrugged. “After a while, you get tired of having to make friends and be nice to people. I have moved a lot, so other than you and my brothers, I don’t really take interest in people. You see where I get the kindred souls thing from now, right?”

 

Dancing, each other, and our brothers – yeah, I understood.

 

“Well, if I’m going to have to put up with you, then I demand you bring me food.”

 

Kai laughed and looked at me with raised brows. “You’re demanding things of your hyung? What is wrong with this kid?”

 

“We’re the same age, when have I called you hyung?” I asked and stuffed a large peace of meat in my mouth. “Besides, if you’re going to use that, than you should take care of your dongsaeng and give him more food.”

 

Kai frowned and looked down at his bento box. “I can ask Kyungsoo hyung to make a second box I guess. He’ll probably make a big deal about me having a friend, but he likes cooking.”

 

“You mean your brother is the one that makes your lunch everyday?”

 

Kai nodded. “Like I said, he likes cooking, sometimes he teaches me.”

 

A picture of Lu Han setting the curry on fire last week popped into my head and I grimaced. “I wish my brother could cook. He burns everything.”

 

“You said your parents don’t live with you guys, and if your brother can’t cook, what do you live off from?”

 

“Order out and ramen,” I answered bitterly. I could just imagine all the delicious meals Kai’s hyung probably made him every night.

 

I felt a hand on the top of my head and looked up just before it began to ruffle my hair, making me close my eyes so my bangs didn’t poke me.

 

“I’ll take pity on you dongsaeng. Not everyone can cook, but I hope your brother at least does other things; you don’t really talk about him. You should tell me more.”

 

“You don’t tell me about your brothers either,” I pointed out and swatted his hand away.

 

“Touché,” he said.

 

**형**

 

I blurrily opened my eyes and looked around. The classroom was empty and I wondered where everyone had gone until I looked up at the clock on the back wall. School had been over for the past thirty minutes. I groaned and my head slipped off from its perched position on my fist. My chin connected with the table before I could catch myself. I just laid my head on the desk for a while, letting my hate for it at the moment flow through the pain in my face into its wooden surface. Then I remembered it was thirty minutes after school was over which meant I was fifteen minutes late for practice.

 

I stood up and grabbed my bag. I didn’t even have time to think if the teacher had saw me asleep or wonder where Kai had gone to, I did not feel like running the track for being late to dance practice. Halfway to the dance room, I had to pause and back track. Down one of the halls that led to the vending machines, stood Kai sipping on one drink and putting coins into the machine for another.

 

“Kai,” I said confused then raised my voice a bit more so he would hear me. “Kim Jongin, what are you doing?”

 

He looked down the hall innocently then smiled when he saw me. “Ah, Sehun, you woke up.”

 

“Yeah, and I’m late for dance practice…are you skipping?” I didn’t think Kai would skip dance practice even if he had already caught up.

 

Kai didn’t answer me right away. He pressed a button on the vending machine and it made a whirling sound before dropping another drink into the slot. Kai reached down and got the drink and walked over towards me.

 

“Practice was cancelled,” he said and handed me the drink he had just gotten then walked around me.

 

“Cancelled?” I asked, turning, holding the drink awkwardly. “Since when?”

 

Kai turned just his head towards me, the straw of his own drink still in his mouth. “About two classes ago; you fell asleep almost as soon as we got back from lunch. I went to check during afternoon break and there was a sign on the door. You sure have a talent for sleeping during class without being noticed.”

 

“Thanks, I practiced,” I said and stabbed the straw into the drink Kai bought for me. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

 

“You said your brother didn’t come home until later so I decided to watch you sleep until it was time to go home. I got thirsty though, so I came out here.”

 

 I took a sip of the drink, but choked listening to Kai. “Watch me sleep? That’s kind of creepy you know.”

 

Kai just shrugged and started walking back towards the classroom. “If you say so. You’re kind of pretty when you sleep though.”

 

I twirled the straw in my drink around as I followed him. “No I’m not, my brother is.”

 

Kai walked to his desk and picked up his back that I had missed seeing after I woke up. “I wouldn’t know since I’ve never seen him.”

 

“I’ve never seen your brothers either,” I pointed out encase he started asking about Lu Han again.

 

He pulled his bag over one shoulder and finished off his drink, squishing it into a ball in his hands. “Sure you have, at least a few of them. They go to school here.”

 

The last sip of my drink came before I realized it and I choked a bit, handing the empty box to Kai. He crushed it as well and threw both of them towards the small trashcan in the classroom as if playing basketball. He made both shots.

 

“If they go to school here, why don’t you hang around with them?” I asked.

 

Kai grimaced. “I hang around with them enough at home. Besides, we kind of have an agreement to keep away from each other at school for the first month.”

 

“Why? Don’t you want to interact with them?”

 

“Sure, but since there is so many of us, it kind of puts off the chance of making other friends if we’re always all together. They still want to make friends after all. You’ll understand more after you meet them.”

 

I perked up hearing that. “Are you insinuating that I’ll get to meet your brothers then?”

 

“Yeah, sure, after I meet yours.”

 

 He grinned at me, but I just glared. “Let’s just go home.”  
  


“No, no, your brother’s still not there, right? Let’s take this opportunity to hangout, Sehun.” Kai grabbed my elbow and started to pull me toward the doors of the school.

 

I tried to tug my arm away, but he didn’t let up until we were actually outside. “I can go home, it’s fine.”

 

“Why can’t we hangout? We’re friends now, come on,” Kai insisted.

 

I hadn’t been out with a friend before, just my brother. Sometimes I tagged along with him when he went with his school friends shopping. It was always annoying though; Lu Han’s friends really liked shopping. Kai seemed to read my expression and lifted a finger in the air.

 

“I will buy you food.”

 

Food…darn food. “Bubble Tea, we can go get Bubble Tea.”

 

Kai laughed and grabbed my elbow again to drag me out of the school yard. “Alright, we’ll get Bubble Tea.”

 

With the promise of Bubble Tea, I probably  would have let him continue to drag me all the way to the shop by my elbow, even hold my hand if he wanted to get that far into skinship, but Kai luckily let me go after a while when he was sure I wouldn’t run away. Not that I would run away with the promise of paid for Bubble Tea. Lu Han use to bribe me with it when he wanted me to go shopping with him and his friends, or bribe me with it when he didn’t want me to go. I hoped Kai wouldn’t use my weakness for the drink like my brother did though; I’d hate to let him have that power over me.

 

We walked into the shop and the clerk immediately greeted me with a warm smile.

 

“The regular?” he asked and I nodded, smiling a bit wryly at him with Kai beside me.  

 

“Make that two,” Kai called to the clerk and then looked at me. “I’m guessing you come here often then?”

 

“Yeah, my brother and I have always gone here since he moved in with us.” I moved to one of the tables in the area and we sat down.

 

“Moved in? You said that your brother was Chinese or something, right?”

 

“Yeah, he’s half Chinese, we have the same mom, but he lived with his grandmother until he was fourteen, then she died and he came to live with us,” I explained.

 

Kai furrowed his brows and put his head on the table. “That must have been tough on him. I’ve always been with my brothers, but they weren’t always with each other.”

 

“What do you mean?” I asked. Actually, I was curious how someone could have seven sons close to the same age, some in the same grades even. I hadn’t heard anything about twins.

 

Kai sat up a bit straighter. “Oh, well you see, we are all not blood related. I’m the only actually child, my brothers are just something like foster children.”

 

 “Foster…children. That must have been interesting for your parents. So were you like the miracle child?”

 

“Maybe.” Kai turned his head to watch the clerk make our Bubble tea. I couldn’t see his expression, but I could tell by the tone of his voice that he wasn’t exactly happy.

 

“I really can’t imagine what it would be like to have six more hyungs, even more so, how to take care of seven boys,” I said and bit my lip. I should have taken the hint that he didn’t want to talk about his family, but I was curious. He always asked me a lot of questions after all.

 

“My parents never really had to take care of them. Kris and Suho do that,” he said.

 

I supposed those where the names of two of his brothers. I stared at the clerk as well who was finally done with our drinks. He shook them and smiled over at me. Kai got up before I could and went to retrieve them and pay. I looked down at my hands and waited. It sounded like his parents weren’t really around probably because of their job; which, if I thought about it, would make sense since he said he was always moving. They sounded a bit like my parents.

 

“Chocolate?” Kai asked setting my drink in front of me, straw already poked through the plastic.

 

I nodded and took a sip, one of the black pearls of tapioca almost hitting the back of my throat and I had to take a second to breathe and chewed on it. “You didn’t have to get the same thing.”

 

“I’ve never tried the chocolate one,” Kai said and took a sip. “Tastes like chocolate.”

 

“Of course it does,” I said and laughed.

 

Kai looked at me, eyebrows raised and he grinned, straw between his teeth. “You laughed. Was that the first time you laughed in front of me?”

 

I looked away, my face feeling red. “Shut up, of course it wasn’t.”

 

Kai laughed and took his seat in front of me. I tapped my straw, bending the edge a bit. He had said he wanted us to be friends, but I could tell he didn’t trust me with some things. It wasn’t like I wanted him to trust me, but I was curious about his brothers now. The only way I would know about them, it seemed, was to trust Kai with something of my own that I had been keeping. Lu Han had been bugging me to meet Kai anyways.

 

“Hey, Kai, as thank you for the bubble tea and stuff…you can come over to my house on the weekend.”

 

**형**

 

“Why didn’t you tell me yesterday that your friend was visiting?” Lu Han asked as he rushed around the house, picking up random things and putting them somewhere else, disappearing into the kitchen at random intervals.

 

I sat on the couch, legs resting on the coffee table in front of me, sipping a bottle of banana milk. There was a cartoon I wanted to watch on, but it was hard to hear what the colorful characters were saying with my brother yelling across the rooms.

 

“What does it matter if I told you this morning or yesterday?” I asked, lifting up my legs as Lu Han darted past.

 

He fluffed up a few of the couch cushions then through a pillow at my head. I held my milk out of the way and the pillow slammed into my face.

 

“It matters because I could have done all of this last night instead of rushing around right now. Do you even know when he’s coming over?”

 

I tucked the pillow behind me and sipped my banana milk. “He said he would call when he was here.”

 

I could feel my brother roll his eyes at me. “That’s helpful. And on the subject of helpfulness, how about you get up and do something. Go pick up your room or cook something.”

 

“You want me to cook something?”

 

Lu Han came to stand in front of the television, hands on his hips. “Yeah, why don’t you cook something since you always complain about my cooking.”

 

“You mean your lack of cooking,” I said and grinned.

 

Lu Han started to say something back, but just froze with his mouth opened, eyes wide. I finished off my banana milk and stood up, going over to him to pat his fluffy light brown hair.

 

“You want me to cook, hyung?”

 

“Yes, since I know how highschoolers eat and with two of you, we’re going to need a lot of refreshments.”

 

I went to the kitchen and I could hear Lu Han follow after me. There were already bowls covering the counter tops, but nothing inside of them. I tossed my empty milk carton in the trash and went to the fridge, pulling out the gallon of milk and then to a cupboard to grab a box. I grabbed one of the large bowls and poured the contents of the box into the bowl. I uncapped the milk and was about the pour that in with it when Lu Han’s hand grabbed my wrist.

 

“Oh no you don’t; what do you think you’re doing, Oh Sehun?”

 

I looked up at my brother trying to seem innocent. “You said to cook; this is the only thing I know how to cook.”

 

Lu Han glared at me and took the milk away. I grinned back.

 

“You’re a brat sometimes, you know that. Go back to the couch and wait for your friend to come; I don’t think he would want to share a huge bowl of cereal with you.”

 

I grabbed a handful of the cereal and made my way out of the kitchen. “Give up on cooking, hyung. You’ll burn the apartment down.”

 

I heard a bowl thrown at me, but it hit the doorway between the kitchen and the living room instead and I laughed. It was maybe twenty minutes later, after my cartoon had finished, that my cell phone rang. My head turned to the direction in which it laid perched on the top of the entertainment system where it was charging. I glared at it as it continued to ring not wanting to get up from the couch.

 

“I swear, Sehun, if I hear ‘Baby, Baby, baby, oh~’ one more time…” Lu Han yelled from the kitchen.

 

I sighed and finally got up, answering my phone. “Hello.”

 

“Hey, Sehun, it’s Kai. You said the sixth floor room sixty-nine, right?” Kai asked. It was hard to hear him; I thought he must be in the lobby where there was always a lot of noise.

 

“Yeah, sixty-nine.”

 

“I’m outside your door now, let me in.”

 

I turned my head towards the door, eyes wide. Or maybe he had just been listening to an Ipod. “I’ll open the door.”

 

“Who was it?” Lu Han asked, sticking his head out the kitchen doorway, a bit white spot on his cheek.

 

“Kai, he’s here.”

 

“What, already?” Lu Han squeaked.

 

I nodded and went to the door, opening it. Kai stood awkwardly outside the door, looking up and down the hall. He jumped when his eyes landed on me and gave me a nervous smile.

 

“You scare easily,” I commented and moved aside so Kai could walk in.

 

“I just didn’t hear you open the door,” he said and slipped off his shoes. “Is it just you and your brother?”

 

“Yeah, or we could just get rid of my brother,” I said, or more like stuff him in his room so Kai wouldn’t have to meet him.

 

“Nah, I’m okay with older guys, I have older brothers myself, remember.”

 

I did remember, but that wasn’t the problem.

 

“Hello,” Kai called looking around. “Thank you for letting me over.”

 

Lu Han came out of the kitchen, wiping his hands on a towel. “Hello, I’m Lu Han, Sehun’s hyung.”

 

I studied Kai’s expression when he saw my brother. His eyes widened and he swallowed, seeming nervous. He bowed a full ninety degrees as he greeted back.

 

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, I’m Kim Jongin, please call me Kai.”

 

“Jongin is a nice name, but Kai’s interesting. You can call me Lu Han hyung.”

 

Kai righted himself and smiled softly at my brother. “Yeah, okay, Lu Han…hyung. Um…Lu Han hyung…you kind of…um.”

 

Lu Han looked at Kai curiously, his head tilted to the side. “What is it?”

 

“Well,” Kai said and reached out his hand toward my brother. His thumb swiped across his cheek where the white powder was. They both stood there awkwardly, Kai with his thumb just breaths length away from Lu Han’s face and Lu Han looking up at him with surprised eyes. I couldn’t take it and grabbed the towel out of Lu Han’s hand and moved my way between them, wiping off the rest of my hyung’s face.

 

“You…had something on your face,” Kai said from behind me.

 

Lu Han laughed. “It would seem so, thank you for trying to wipe if off.”

 

I stuffed the towel back into Lu Han’s hand and grabbed Kai’s elbow. “Come on, don’t stand at the door all day, I’ll show you around.”

 

“Oh, while you two do that, I’ll run down to the convenience store real quick and get you guys snacks.”

 

I turned around. “Whatever happened to you making us something?”

 

Lu Han puffed his flushed cheeks at me. “Let’s not discuss that in front of your friend.” He slipped his shoes on and opened the door before suddenly turning back. “Also, you probably want to stay out of the kitchen until I come back.” With that, Lu Han left and I turned to Kai.

 

Kai smiled. “Your brother seems nice.”

 

“Yeah, _my_ brother is nice.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 – In Which We Model**

 

 

Kai was leisurely scanning the vending machines during break as if I had not just asked him a question. I leaned against one of the rectangles of metal and junk food and waited for him to choose before I would continue to pester him. Finally, he lifted a finger and pressed a button and a wrapped bread fell out. He immediately went to nibbling on it, switching it off with his bottle of banana milk so that there weren’t even milliseconds of time in which he did not have something in his mouth.

 

“So you’re just going to continue to ignore me then,” I said, glaring at my friend.

 

“I’m not ignoring you,” Kai said as he switched between his food.

 

“Really, because you haven’t answered me; it’s been a week since you met my brother, when do I get to meet yours.”

 

Kai’s bottle made a slurping sound and he frowned at the empty container. “You don’t have to meet them to be friends, isn’t that something only lovers do, meet each others families.”

 

I made a disgusted face. “I would never be your lover, Kim Jongin.”

 

Kai raised a brow at me. “I’m not asking you to be. Why is this so important to you?”

 

“Because I let you meet my brother,” I said. I didn’t let people meet my brother for no reason. When he was still in high school and classmates would come over, I stood guard at the door until Lu Han or one of our parents pushed me aside. My brother use to call me a guard dog, and for a while I didn’t mind it. I could still remember the bulling he went through.

 

“Fine, let me think about it,” Kai said and threw his bread wrapper and milk carton away.

 

I kept my arms crossed as we walked down the vending hall and the bathrooms toward the main hall to go back to class. Kai suddenly stopped and I looked at him to see a look of horror on his face.

 

“Jongin! Hey, dongsaeng!” someone called.

 

I looked at the entrance of the small hall where the main hall cut to down here and saw a group of three boys standing there. One really tall one waved frantically at Kai, a ridiculously wide grin on his face and orange curls bouncing. A shorter boy stood with large confused eyes before he smiled and waved as well, though not as enthusiastically. The third boy I thought might try to kill me. His eyes were sharp and I imagined that he often wore dark colors like black and red, but the yellow and black uniforms the school assigned seemed to match him as well, giving him a sort of killer bee presence.

 

“Shit,” Kai mumbled under his breath and I looked at him curiously.

 

Killer Bee walked forward first. He took long strides toward us and wrapped his arms around Kai’s neck hanging off from him and his face softened becoming more of a Koala…no, a panda wearing a yellow blazer. The other two followed, the taller joining in the hug, still grinning, one side of his face scrunched up, and the other just patted the top of Kai’s head.

 

“Hey Jongin, this is the first time we’ve run into you during school,” the tall one said.

 

Kai just stared forward. “Yeah, well I’m not the one that really cared about the, ‘no interactions until we’ve made friends’ rule.”

 

The tall one moved away and stood beside the wide eyed boy. “Don’t be like that, Jongin. You made a friend after all.”

 

Kai glanced over at me and his face looked a little red. I realized these were his brothers.

 

“You should introduce us,” said the wide eyed boy with a smile towards me that was welcoming and I relaxed a little.

 

Kai pushed off his clinging brother who frowned and looked like a kicked cat, but almost immediately went back to his killer bee mode.

 

“Sehun, these are three of my brothers. The clingy one is Tao, he’s a grade above us with Kyungsoo hyung, the one that makes the food,” Kai said indicating the wide eyes boy and I smiled at him gratefully. He had been providing my stomach with actually food for the past week during lunch. I added a bow as well. The food was really delicious.

 

“What about me?” the tall one asked, pouting. It was weird to see him pout. Actually, he was just a bit weird in general.

 

I studied him. When he wasn’t all hyper and clinging, just standing there with a pout, he was kind of pretty, but his voice. I hadn’t taken notice of it at first, but it was deep, deeper than Kai’s. It didn’t match him at all.

 

Kai sighed and made a gesture toward the taller boy. “That’s Chanyeol, he’s a third year.”

 

His name was Chanyeol.

 

“Hyungs,” Kai continued, “this is Oh Sehun, my friend.”

 

I looked over the three of them then at Kai. They looked nothing alike, but Kai had said they were foster brothers. “I thought you said you had six of them.”

 

“The older two are out of school already and…” Kai looked around and then his eyes met his taller brother. “Where’s Baekhyun?”

 

Chanyeol’s face darkened and he shifted his stance. “Where do you think? He’s been following after some weird kid from our class.”

 

Kai rolled his eyes. “Of course he is. Can’t he just stick with you for one move through?”

 

“You know how he is,” Kyungsoo said. “It can’t be helped; he has to find someone to bother that way.”

 

My mind felt fuzzy. When one said something, I thought I knew what they were talking about, but then the other would say something and I’d get confused again. All I figured out was this Baekhyun was troublesome to the family somehow, in particular, Chanyeol.

 

“Hyungs, the bell’s going to ring soon,” Kai said and grabbed my elbow to pull us past his brothers.

 

Killer Bee…or Tao, right? Well, he jumped and rushed down the hall toward the vending machines mumbling something about cake and Chanyeol followed him.

 

“He forgot his money,” Kyungsoo said. He smiled at both of us before following the other two to the vending machines.

 

“Well, your brothers are interesting,” I said as we walked back to class.

 

“I like yours more.”

 

**형**

 

Lu Han was rushing around again tidying everything up. He had yet to go to the kitchen, but I figured he would get his hands on that room tomorrow morning. He stopped for a moment to wipe his forehead and turned to me with a smile as I sat on the couch eating from a bag of chips.

 

“I’m glad you told me Kai was coming before the day he was actually coming this time,” my brother said.

 

“He came over last weekend, too. This is the third time. I don’t see why you have to clean every time,” I said and stuffed a handful of chips into my mouth. “

 

“Yes, but I wasn’t here last weekend and you didn’t tell me he was coming,” Lu Han said and grabbed the chips away from me.

 

“Hey!” I crossed my arms and frowned as Lu Han rustled a hand around in the chip bag. “It’s just Kai, no special reason to clean just because he’s coming over.”

 

Lu Han looked inside the bag and then grabbed a handful, stuffing them in his mouth as well. He chewed them loudly, crumbs falling onto his shirt and I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. He was getting things dirty and he had just been cleaning. This was probably why the apartment always needed tidying.

 

“We’re two young adults living in a two bedroom two story apartments, when anyone comes over it needs to be cleaned,” Lu Han explained.

 

I reached out and tried to grab the bag back from him, but Lu Han held the chips out of my reached and scrunched his nose at me as he chewed his chips.

 

“Tch, you never clean when your friends visit.”

 

“That’s because Xiumin usually just cleans everything anyways and Yixing hogs the kitchen. Besides, you never have guests over, that means this Kai must be really special to you.” He gave me a look that sent shivers down my spine and I stuck my tongue out.

 

“That’s gross, hyung. You’re the one that wants in his pants,” I said then regretted it seeing the expression on my brother’s face.

 

His face was pink and eyes wide like a deer’s. He turned away from me and handed the chips back. I took them and leaned towards him. “Don’t make those kinds of jokes.”

 

“I’m sorry hyung.”

 

“I guess I teased you to it,” Lu Han said and pulled his legs up onto the couch. “It’s just; you have never brought anyone over before. I thought, even if you had friends, you would never invite them over, it would have to be someone like a girlfriend…or a boyfriend.”

 

“And why is that?” I asked starting to stuff the chips in my mouth again.

 

Lu Han laid his head on his knees and looked at me with a soft smile and I stared into the chip bag.

 

“Because of me. You’ve always been like my little guard puppy. I couldn’t even bring a girlfriend inside without you looking like you would shred her to bits if she took one step out of line.”

 

“You don’t like girls, hyung.” I started eating the chips again.

 

Lu Han chuckled. “Yes, I figured that out quickly thanks to you. But if that’s how you act with a girl I can’t even imagine what you would do with my boyfriend.”

 

I dropped the bag of chips and looked at Lu Han horrified. “You have a boyfriend!”

 

He sat up straight and waved his hands at me. “No, no, don’t worry, Sehun. Your precious older brother is still chaste at twenty-one.”

 

I raised an eyebrow at him. “One hundred percent?”

 

“Kisses don’t count, you saw my first kiss.”

 

The memory of my brother’s first kiss wasn’t a pleasant one. He had just come home from a date with a girl from his class and I watched them on the porch from the little window nearby when we still lived in a house. He was forcing a smile as he said his goodbyes to her, at least I could tell it was a forced smile and she leaned up and pressed her lips messily to his before running away. He was still fourteen then and I was ten, but I wanted to rip the girls head off at the distressed almost teary reaction my brother had toward his stolen first kiss. He went out with a couple more girls until he graduated middle school and then he confided in me he was a homosexual.

 

“I still don’t see what the big deal is. You bring the bun looking guy and the one that’s always eating our chips here all the time.”

 

“I’m the only one allowed to call Xiumin a Baozi and Yixing cooks for us, so let him eat the snacks if he wants. You have known them both for two years now, can’t you remember their names?”

 

“They’re Chinese names, it’s hard~, and that one isn’t even Chinese, why do you call him by that?” I asked and stuffed more potato chips in my mouth. The bag was almost empty.

 

“Because I’m Chinese,” Lu Han said in response and stole the bag from me again. He tilted his head back and held the bag upside down over his mouth, tapping it to get the last chip crumbs into his mouth. He wadded the empty bag up and threw it at me. “I’ll go see what food we have. I might have to go shopping in a bit to see what I need to cook for you guys tomorrow.” He started toward the kitchen.

 

I wadded the bag up even more and got up to follow him. “Cook for us, why do you need to cook for us. Aren’t you supposed to go shopping with your friend that eats the chips?”

 

“His name is Yixing, and I was supposed to, but then he caught his girlfriend cheating on him. His only day off from work is tomorrow so he’s going to take her on a date and break it off,” Lu Han said and started searching through the cupboards.

 

“He has a girlfriend? I thought he was gay.”

 

“Just because I’m gay and you’re gay doesn’t make my friends automatically gay.”

 

I threw the bag toward the trash on the other side of Lu Han. It missed and fell to the side pathetically. “Who said I was gay.”

 

Lu Han gave me a pointed look and I waved my hands in front of me defensively. My brother rolled his eyes and continued.

 

“So, instead, I’m going to hang out with you guys.”

 

“What if I don’t want you to hang out with us?”

 

Lu Han looked at me with mostly fake hurt, clutching his chest and pouty lips parted. “You hurt me, dongsaeng. Have you finally gotten tired of following your older brother around, or have I gotten too old to hangout with you kids.”

 

I sighed and leaned against one of the counters. “That’s not it.”

 

He smiled and reached out patting my head. “I’m going to go get stuff to cook with then.”

 

“Why do you want to cook? You know it’s just going to fail.”

 

Lu Han huffed. “You said Kai’s older brother has been making him two lunches to feed you as well. It makes me look bad as an older brother, so I should at lease have snacks ready for Kai when he visits, return the favor.”

 

“The best way for you to return the favor would be to not.”

 

My brother reached out and pinched my cheek. “Why you…” He trailed off with a sigh and leaned in to peck my cheek. “I’ll be back in a bit. Be good and I will return with bubble tea.”

 

**형**

 

“Sehun, change your darn ringtone already!” Lu Han yelled from the kitchen.

 

I groaned and blindly reached out toward the coffee table where my cellphone was blaring Justin Beiber. Lu Han use to like him, too, until I made one of his songs my ringtone. I picked up the phone and clumsily felt around the edge of the touch screen until I was near where I knew the answer button would be and put the phone to my ear.

 

“Hello,” I answered groggily.

 

A low chuckled answered me and I blinked my eyes.

 

“Sehun, are you sleeping? It’s two in the afternoon and I’m on my way to your house.”

 

“I fell asleep on the couch and okay, text when you get here,” I said then hung up, rolling onto my side on the couth, curling up, planning to sleep until Kai arrived.

 

“Sehun, who was it?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Kai, he’s on his way.” I didn’t bother opening my eyes when I heard my brother walk into the living room.

 

“Is he, I’m not finished with the snacks yet.”

 

“You’re not cooking, are you?”

 

I felt something collide with my head and sat up, a towel falling off my face and into my lap. I picked up the towel, making a face when I noticed it was damp and finally looked at my brother.

 

“I’m not using the stove, alright, now get up and make sure you have what you two are going to spend the day doing ready. You have slept enough.”

 

I stretched then ruffled my hair. All I really wanted to do was nap, but I had to keep inviting Kai over if I wanted him to let me see more of his family. They were interesting to me, how he had six brothers that did not share even half his blood and I had only met half of them. Plus, he had begged me saying it was more fun just the two of us on the weekends instead of spending it in a house full of six other boys. Having one older brother was fun for me, but I could never understand what six of them would be like.

 

Getting off the couch was hard, my body refused to move, flopping back down on the cushions with every attempt until I heard Lu Han walk out of the kitchen then I stood up quickly. He didn’t even look at me, just went straight to the bathroom. I stretched again and let out a groan. The doorbell rang and my eyes widened as I looked at the door. It was silent for a few seconds before it rang again accompanied by a knock. I jumped when my cellphone rang and picked it up to see a text from Kai. I looked at the door curiously before going over to it, phone in hand.

 

“Who is it?” Lu Han called, poking his head out of the doorway. He had white foam on his face, shaving though I didn’t think he really needed to.

 

“Kai,” I answered and opened the door to reveal my grinning friend. He raised a hand at me then Lu Han whose head was visible, waving though it looked more like he was trying to grab at something.

 

Lu Han squealed and ducked back into the bathroom. Kai chuckled and I turned to him with a raised eyebrow at my brother’s reaction. “Come in then. You got here fast.”

 

Kai shrugged. “I walk fast.”

 

I wondered if maybe he lived close by because he always seemed to make it here in ten minutes or less. But, that didn’t seem right as, when we walked home, he stopped at one of the bus stops that led to the forested area which was at least a thirty minute trip. He probably just forgot to call when he left his house, or didn’t get signal until a certain point between our two homes. That was the only logical reasoning.

 

Kai slipped his shoes off and walked to the couch, sitting down. I took a glance toward the bathroom before moving over to sit next to Kai and flipped on the television putting it on the channel that the show we both liked was going to be on.

 

“My brother wasn’t supposed to be here today. He was going to go shopping, but his plans got canceled.”

 

“It’s okay, I don’t mind hanging out with both of you,” Kai said and I saw his eyes glance toward the bathroom.

 

“I can tell him to stay in his room if you want; he probably has a project to work on anyways.”

 

Kai shook his head and smiled. “I really don’t mind, I like Lu Han hyung, he’s cool.”

 

Lu Han came out then and disappeared into the kitchen. I could hear him rattling things about, probably finishing up whatever he was making. He cleared his throat when he came into the living room carrying a large tray with two plates and three glasses. He set it down on the coffee table and I noticed he had one plate full of crackers with cheese and some other stuff for us to put on them and then another plate with some kind of microwaveable snack, mini pizza or something. He probably thought it was an impressive display, but it looked American to me and all I really cared about was the chocolate Bubble Tea Lu Han placed in front of me. It was nice living two streets away from a Bubble Tea place.

 

“I made you guys snacks. I’m not a very good cook so I apologize if they don’t taste good.”

 

“You didn’t even cook these,” I mumbled and felt Lu Han’s gaze on me.

 

Kai leaned forward and picked up one of the microwaveable things, popping it into his mouth and he smiled. “It’s good. Kyungsoo hyung doesn’t really let us eat junk food so it’s nice to have something like this every now and then.”

 

Lu Han took a seat on the chair beside Kai and leaned forward, taking one of the microwaveable things as well. I sipped on my Bubble Tea.

 

“Kyungsoo, is that the brother that cooks for you? I need to thank him for feeding my little brother as well.”

 

Kai nodded and sipped the Bubble Tea Lu Han had given him. “Yeah, he likes cooking for us. We call him Umma sometimes.”

 

Lu Han laughed. “Umma? Doesn’t your mother get confused who you are talking about then?”

 

Kai started playing with his straw, looking off onto the opposite wall. “I’m the only one that calls my parents Umma and Appa; the others call them by their names so it’s not confusing.”

 

“Them?”

 

Kai turned to Lu Han, smiling. “Yeah, Kyungsoo and his boyfriend, they got fostered together.”

 

“Aw, that’s sweet.”

 

Kai nodded then looked down at his lap. “Everyone’s sort of jealous of them, but they’re happy.”

 

I sipped air through my straw and moved it obnoxiously against the plastic to get their attention away from each other. Lu Han looked at me first and then cleared it throat. He stood up and gave us both a friendly smile. “Well, I actually have some projects to work on, so you two have fun.”

 

“Oh, college projects, what do you go to college for?” Kai asked.

 

“Oh, photography mainly and then I minor in Chinese Culture.”

 

“Oh, yeah, Sehun said you were half Chinese. I have two brothers who are Chinese, they’re actual brothers.”

 

“That’s rare; I would love to meet them.”

 

“Yeah, what is your project on?”

 

“Right now I’m studying the human body, so my projects have to have models.”

 

“Do you have a model here?”

 

“Sehun.”

 

“But Sehun and I are hanging out.”

 

I just sat there and watched them converse, sipping my drink. It felt lighter and I knew it would run out soon. Maybe I could ask Lu Han to go get me another but I wasn’t allowed more than one Bubble Tea a day. Maybe he wouldn’t notice and leave anyways. I just needed him to leave, or Kai to leave.

 

Lu Han laughed nervously. “It seems I’ve been caught.”

 

Kai turned to me. I didn’t like the expression on his face, eager and begging almost. “Let’s help your brother? We weren’t really going to do anything, right?”

 

We were going to watch our show then have a rematch on Star Craft because I could not accept the fact he wiped me out last time. We were going to do a lot, actually.

 

“Fine,” I said and stood up. “Just don’t give me a weird hairstyle this time, hyung.”

 

We walked up the stairs to the top floor where the two bedrooms where. Lu Han held the second door opened for us and I lead Kai into my brother’s large room. It was the size of our school’s dance studio, a little smaller. Once side had all the usually bedroom stuff – a bed with Donald Duck sheets and stuffed plushies littered on it, a desk with piled with his computer and camera equipment, a side table and a wardrobe. The other side was covered in a black backdrop, lights circling it and rolls of different backgrounds and costumes on the side.

 

Lu Han went over and tried to tidy up the backdrops, but they just feel back down and he sighed. “I want to do a natural look, just t-shirts and jeans.”

 

I looked Kai up and down. He was wearing a sweat-shirt and his jeans were torn a bit at the bottom with dirt on them.

 

“Kai, can I try pictures of you? But you’ll have to change your clothes.”

 

“Okay.”

 

Lu Han looked through his stack of costumes and pulled out a clean pair of jeans and a t-shirt. He handed them to Kai and then threw me a t-shirt saying he didn’t like the one I was wearing. I went to the corner of the room and pulled my shirt off, putting the other one on instead.

 

“Wait, Kai, don’t put it on.”

 

I turned around to see why my brother had changed his mind. Lu Han stood in front of Kai, his hand reached out, but head down, avoiding looking at him.  Kai was already in the jeans, but he was shirtless. His slight tan was more obvious now that his whole upper body was revealed. I wondered how long he had to stroll along beaches to get it to stay there so permanently and smoothly.

 

“Do you not like this shirt?” Kai asked handing the shirt back to Lu Han.

 

My brother turned around and put it back in the pile of clothes he used as costumes. “It’s not that, you just have a nice body line. Can I take pictures without a shirt?”

 

Kai stretched his arms above his head. He was thin, but there was muscle there. I poked my stomach, feeling the softness through my shirt, the result of eating too much snack food. Lu Han said my shoulders were broad, but I would have to eat healthier if I wanted to be manlier. I looked at Kai’s body again and wondered became more determined to get invited to his house. If I could start eating dinner there I would be too full for junk food.

 

“Okay, both of you go stand in the middle, just kind of relaxed like,” Lu Han said after changing the backdrop to a gray.

 

We positioned ourselves and waited for Lu Han to begin snapping his camera. He took a few shots before stopping. He looked at the preview screen on his camera then at Kai and his eyes stayed there.

 

“You’re really good at this, Kai.”

 

“I did a few shoots in France for amateur photographers, nothing published though. Got a lot of offers.”

 

Show off, except his tone was neutral, like it wasn’t something he thought of as a big deal, but sounded a lot more impressive said out loud.   

 

“It’s…kind of sexy, your expressions,” Lu Han said with a smile and I caught a tint of pink on his cheeks.

 

“Should I not be sexy?” Kai asked. His voice was lower, slower. I felt like he only meant for Lu Han to heart him.

 

Lu Han shook his head, fiddling with the camera options. “No, sexy is good…for jean commercials. Let’s do individual shots now.”

 

I shifted and my brother’s eyes moved to me. He blinked then licked his lips and gestured toward his bed. “Go finish your nap for earlier, I’m going to do Kai first.”

 

I looked at him confused, and slowly moved to the bed. I laid there hugging one of Lu Han’s Stitch plushies and watched him take pictures of my shirtless friend. I didn’t like the way Kai looked as if he was sexing the camera. I didn’t like the way Lu Han kept clicking away at his camera, stuttering a bit when giving Kai directions. I didn’t like that his camera card filled up before it was my turn and so we stopped and went downstairs. Then Kai said he had to go back home now and picked up his Bubble Tea and left and Lu Han stayed in his room as I blankly made my way down to the living room and finished my drink and stole Lu Han’s and mindlessly ate the snacks as I watched television.


	4. And Then Lu Han Becomes Weird

**Chapter 4 – And Then Lu Han Becomes Weird**

 

 

Dance practice was unusually hard that day. The teacher had come up with moves that seemed not her usual style that required a lot of concentration and natural flow. By break time, Kai and I were flopped in a corner of the room, drenched in sweat, holding water bottles that we didn’t have the energy to open.

 

“I didn’t know having someone else teach dance steps I made up would be that hard,” Kai said.

 

I rolled over onto my side to see Kai. He stared up at the ceiling of the dance studio with a huge smile, sweat trickling down his face. “You made those steps?”

 

“Some of them, the teacher looked like she was having trouble when I passed by during one of our breaks and I showed her some.”

 

“You suck; don’t show the teacher steps that will make her come up with this hard of choreography.”

 

“Hard choreography is fun though,” Kai said.

 

 “Once it’s learned, yeah.”

 

“Class,” the instructor said, clapping her hands. “Since this choreography is hard, I’ll give you a twenty minute break, but be ready to finish up our last fifteen minutes with hard crisp run throughs. I’d advise practicing parts you don’t feel comfortable with.”

 

The class groaned out a yes and the teacher left to her office. I sighed and sat up, finally opening my water bottle and took a long swig before dumping some on my hair. I looked over at Kai. He was sitting up as well, pulling his t-shirt off, his muscle shirt under clinking to the soaked material and it rode up to reveal his tan abs, wet with sweat. I stared at them thinking Lu Han weird for wanting so many pictures of Kai without his shirt on. Wasn’t it embarrassing? I wondered what he would do with the pictures he didn’t end up using for class. I made a face at the images that popped up in my mind in answer.

 

“So, what did your brother do with the pictures he took of us?” Kai asked leaning against the wall.

 

You mean of you, but I didn’t say that, instead I leaned against the wall as well and didn’t look at him. “I don’t know it takes him a while to decide which ones he’s going to edit and then turn in.”

 

Kai was silent for a bit and I figured he was resting. I turned my head and saw him looking off in space seeming deep in thought. His tongue poked out and he licked his lips before turning to me.

 

“Sehun…you know…your brother…”

 

“Yeah, I know my brother, he’s my brother,” I said.

 

Kai laughed nervously. “That’s not what I meant. Is he like…is he dating anyone?”

 

I put the cap back on my water bottle and held the bottle up to my mouth, chewing on it. “No. He doesn’t really date.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“Because he’s gay. It’s difficult to date seriously when you’re gay.”

 

“Yeah, it kind of is, especially here. You two are the only ones that know about Kyungsoo.”

 

I nodded and took a glance at Kai. He was nibbling on his fingers seeming nervous. “I’m gay, too, and…”

 

No, I didn’t want to hear that. I turned my head away.

 

“Never mind,” Kai said and sighed.

 

I stayed looking away and took the bottle away from my mouth, putting it on the floor. I tipped it on its side and spun it around. The bottle cap pointed towards the wall of mirrors and at the reflection of Kai in it. I turned it so it pointed at me instead.

 

“Oh, you know, I left my undershirt there, the tank top I wore under my sweater,” Kai said.

 

“Tank top...what color was it?”

 

“Just white, but it had something written in English on it, some logo in black,” Kai explained.

 

I thought about if for a moment trying to remember. When Lu Han had said he had filled up his card they had stared at each other for a little while before Kai stood up from the stool in which Lu Han had had him perched on for the last few pictures. Lu Han said they wouldn’t take anymore and Kai went to his clothes and took out his phone. He said he had to go and pulled on his sweater and changed his jeans and left. I didn’t remember seeing a tank top when I followed to the door. Lu Han might have.

 

“I’ll ask Lu Han about it when I get home,” I said and stood up to go over a few of the moves.

 

“It wasn’t important or anything, but it would be nice if you could bring it to school tomorrow,” Kai said.

 

“You could come get it.” Then I remembered I didn’t want him to come to my house, Lu Han would be there all this week.

 

“Nah, I have to be home, my brothers keep saying I spend too much time with you, but I’ve only been there three days.”

 

I did a twirl that involved some hand motions and frowned when they weren’t snappy enough. “You spend all school with me, too.”

 

Kai stood up. “Every few moves I just want to not be around them. I love them, but they’re annoying, particularly right now that I’m sixteen. Sixteen’s a big age for me. Here, your arm should be like this.”

 

I let Kai fix my arm into position and show me how to snap it correctly while twirling. “Why is sixteen so important?”

 

“Just for reasons, other culture reasons.”

 

I didn’t understand which culture he meant and he didn’t go into it further, just continued to show me how to properly do the step I was practicing until the teacher came back a few minutes shy of the promised twenty minutes and told us to start again.

 

Once practice was over, Kai and I walked out of school together and down the usual road. He bought me banana milk at the convenience store before the bus stop we parted at and then bought me a lunch box as well saying it was my supper and to share it with Lu Han because we ate too much junk food. We stood at the bus stop drinking banana milk, both sweaty and needing a shower and I knew every other time I would have already left him there, but something kept me waiting for the bus with him.

 

I heard the sound of an empty drink being slurped and turned to see Kai staring at his empty banana milk container. He frowned and tossed it into the trash can at the bus stop. 

 

“I should go now, get home safely, Kai,” I said and turned around.

 

“Sehun, wait.”

 

I stopped, but didn’t turn back.

 

“Sehun, I want to date your brother.”

 

 

**형**

 

It started raining before I got to the apartment building. I never did watch the news and Lu Han usually checked it on his phone when he woke up then he would text me or tell me if he was awake when I woke up in the mornings. He hadn’t done either that day. I thought it would be a sunny day even thought clouds had been hanging over the whole time. It was going to be a sunny day because Lu Han hadn’t said otherwise, but he hadn’t said a lot since last night. He didn’t come out of his room after Kai left and I found him passed out on his desk this morning. When I moved the mouse of his computer, pictures of Kai littered the screen in his editing program. One of them had kitty ears and a crown drawn on it with ‘I give up’ written on the bottom of the picture.

 

Now with Kai’s parting words replaying in my mind, that scene this morning felt wrong.

 

“I want to date your brother.”

 

I mouthed the sentence as I reached the last step to the sixth floor of our apartment soaked in a mixture of sweat and rain water, I wasn’t’ sure. The elevators had been crowded because of the rain and I just wanted the quiet emptiness of the stairway as I walked aimlessly up to our floor. I opened the door and walked onto the sixth floor hall way and down to our apartment. I didn’t bother with the key, knowing Lu Han would already be here since I took so long getting home. The doorknob opened easily and I took off my shoes. It wasn’t until I walked past the kitchen that I realized the apartment was unusually quiet.

 

“Hyung?” I called softly, but didn’t hear anything. I figured he must have been in his room working on his pictures. He might ask me to come into his room later for a photo shoot before bed since he didn’t get to me yesterday. At least I hoped he would before his project was due.

 

I decided to take a bath. As soon as I walked into my room I realized there wasn’t much of a choice. The smell of rain water didn’t really cover up the smell of the dried sweat from dance practice being covered by another layer of sticky sweat from walking up the stairs. I grabbed a change of clothes and headed back downstairs to the bathroom.

 

I let the warm water cascade down my body and sighed happily, feeling clean. When the shampoo was thickly foamed into my hair, I suddenly just stopped. My hands fell to my sides and I stood there, the water on my back and shampoo starting to fall onto my face and shoulders. I stood there and Kai’s words began to replay again.

 

He wanted to date my brother.

 

He liked him.

 

Why?

 

We had been friends for a month now; he hadn’t befriended me just to get into my brother’s pants, right? He couldn’t have, he hadn’t met him until two weeks ago. They had only met twice, how could he want to date my brother already? Kai would just have to get his heart broken. I couldn’t allow him to date Lu Han even if he was my best friend. Was it because he was pretty? Because he was nice? Well there were plenty of pretty and nice girls at school and if it was because he was gay, well there were clubs for that, he didn’t have to hook up with the first gay man he met….though technically Lu Han was the second.

 

The shampoo slid across one of my eyes and I hissed as it stung. I moved my head under the water and rinsed myself off, stepping out of the shoulder and did a quick dry off. I caught my reflection in the mirror over the sink and went over to it, grabbing a tooth brush feeling the need to brush my teeth even though I hadn’t eaten supper yet. I didn’t even bother putting toothpaste on the brush, just ran the bristles under water and stuck it in my mouth, lazily running it over my teeth and tongue.

 

Lu Han didn’t like Kai back. I mean, he was four years older than us, and he wasn’t the manliest. He would want an older guy who could take care of us both, right? Even if I let Kai confess to Lu Han, he would just get turned down. It would be best for me to just tell Kai when I saw him tomorrow that there wasn’t any use in getting rejected.

 

Yes, he would get rejected, so I was doing him a favor as his friend. Because I was his friend.

 

I slammed my hands down onto the sink’s edge and the toothbrush fell from my mouth.

 

Because I was his friend.

 

I finally got dressed and left the bathroom. I looked around the bottom floor and still saw no signs of Lu Han. I went to the kitchen and opened the fridge, taking out a water bottle and downing it. He must have still been working or napping. I decided to go see what he was doing and offer to model for him.

 

I use to hate modeling for Lu Han. The first time he asked I refused and ran to my room. Dad yelled at me and insisted I help my brother out since it was his first college project. Lu Han came in a little after that with big puppy eyes and clung to me until I said yes. He bought me Bubble Tea after his first project came back an A so I continued to help him.

 

I made my way back up the stairs and headed to Lu Han’s room. The door was closed and I put one hand on the door knob and the other up to knock. I heard movement behind the door and stopped. It sounded like Lu Han was shifting around. Was he on his bed? Was he having a bad dream because his project was due? I pushed down on the doorknob and opened Lu Han’s door a crack to look in. I could see his bed from there. My eyes widened and I moved to the wall opposite his door. When I felt drool leak out from the corner of my mouth for having it opened too long, I lifted my hand to cover it and slid down the wall.

 

I wish I hadn’t seen it, my brother on his bed with his pants off. He had a white tank top pressed against his face, sniffing it and his hand…his hand was down there doing things I didn’t want to know and I felt sick.

 

Now that I had seen the shirt, I did remember it, Kai had worn it during dance practice once, the shirt my brother was using to masturbate to.

 

 

**형**

 

It was frustrating, Lu Han thought when the first thing his eyes landed on when he woke up was his computer screen littered with pictures of his younger brother’s best friend, shirtless and staring deeply into the camera. He was frustrating. Why did he have to look into the camera like that, his dark eyes so deep and steady? They seemed dangerous yet innocent. This sixteen year old boy was dangerous for Lu Han.

 

Lu Han stretched and yawned and sat back in his chair. He stared at the screen some more and started clicking through the pictures, his finger moving slower on the mouse as a pink blush crossed his cheeks mesmerized by the photos. The way Kai’s skin fitted over his muscles, the slopes and lines well on their way to forming perfect abs and pecs. He reminded Lu Han of one of those white marble statues in the art history books he had in his first year of college – white marble dusted in a fine film of gold because his slightly darker skin was pretty to Lu Han. Really though, he was a beautiful boy. 

 

The ticking of the clock in Lu Han’s room made him look to see what time it was. He was late for his first class and decided to skip it, just a lecture he had with Xiumin and he could get notes from his older friend. He took his time getting ready and left and came back after his next two classes and some time spent in the computer lab still staring at the pictures of Kai and never figuring out how he was to edit them.

 

He looked perfect like that.

 

Once home again, Lu Han washed his face and then sat in front of his computer again and decided to try and edit the pictures of Kai and Sehun. He kept his eyes trained on his brother, starting the usual edits he would make to Sehun’s face, covering up this pimple, erasing that stray hair. Sehun was a good model, but sometimes he didn’t show the emotion Lu Han wanted him to convey. He would be good for commercials and cat walks, Lu Han always thought, but he only had a few pictures of Sehun and so his eyes went back to Kai.

 

He couldn’t do this.

 

Lu Han ran the paintbrush tool along the contours of Kai’s body, tongue poking out between his lips. There were a couple spots here and there, but after he fixed them and stepped back, he clicked crtl z and undid them. Lu Han kicked the wall under his desk and leaned back, covering his face with his hands. It wasn’t fair. Why was he attracted to a sixteen year old boy?

 

Lu Han finally admitted it to himself. He found Kai attractive. His innocent dark eyes, his skin, his lips, the way he unconsciously smirked at Lu Han when he talked to him, a different expression than when he talked to Sehun. And then there was Sehun, how he was nice to his dear younger brother.

 

And then there was Sehun.

 

That was the problem. Kai was Sehun’s best friend. He wasn’t sure if Sehun had a crush on Kai, he was entitled to believe his brother when he said he wasn’t interested in him like that. The fact Lu Han was four years older and so basically a pedophile for be attracted to the younger boy paled to the problems liking Kai would cause with Sehun. He loved Sehun.

 

He needed to stop. It had been years since he had tried dating. Honestly he had lost the will when he found out he would be in charge of taking care of Sehun. Maybe he should date someone even if Sehun threw a fit and tried to chase them away when Lu Han brought them over. He needed someone that Sehun would approve of, that his little brother could trust.

 

He trusted Kai.

 

Which was probably the biggest reason why Lu Han found himself attracted to the younger boy.

 

Lu Han stood up and walked around his room. He went over to his pile of costumes and decided to fold them so they wouldn’t get wrinkled – he hated ironing. He paused when his hand landed on a white tank top. Lu Han held it opened and stared at the black logo on the white material and frowned. Whose was this, it definitely wasn’t one of his costumes and he didn’t think Sehun wore this brand. It looked French. Lu Han brought the material to his nose to smell it. It smelt worn, musky, like someone had worn it, but hadn’t sweated in it. He sniffed it again. It wasn’t his or Sehun’s musk.

 

Kai’s shirt.

 

It must have been Kai’s shirt; no one else had been in the house recently. Lu Han stood up still holding the tank top. He took another sniff. It wasn’t a bad smell; Lu Han wondered what cologne or deodorant Kai wore to leave this kind of smell on his clothes. He looked down at the shirt, moving the material between his fingers and felt his body grown warm. 

 

He’d get it out of his system. It had been a while anyways.

 

Lu Han unzipped his jeans and pulled them down with his underwear while still holding onto Kai’s tank top. His body shivered with nervous excitement. Was he really about to jerk off to his brother’s friend’s shirt? Yeah, yeah he was.

 

He moved to his bed, pushing the plushie and random character pillows behind him so he had a comfortable place to lean back on and sighed. He picked up Kai’s shirt and brother it to his nose, sniffing it again, eyes fluttering closed. He imagined this was Kai that he was hovering over him. Lu Han moved his hand down and began stroking himself and imagined it was Kai’s hand moving up and down his member, dabbing at the tip with his thumb. Kai would then lean into his ear and just breathe and he could imagine the younger boy’s breaths being heavy and deep, mixed with low moans.

 

Lu Han tilted his head back and let a moan escape his lips. What time was it? He didn’t care and let another moan go imagining more. He lifted his shirt and ran Kai’s tank top down his chest and stomach as if Kai was moving down his body. The fabric of his shirt would be followed by the touch of his lips against Lu Han’s white skin, those thick full lips and Lu Han would ask for those lips to be somewhere else. Would Kai kiss him, tease him by pretending to be innocent and thinking Lu Han meant his lips? Lu Han would take the kisses anyway and whine, he did whine.

 

Kai’s lips would finally leave his and he would settle his head between Lu Han’s legs. Lu Han guessed he was the smirking type since he was a dongsaeng and he always found them bratty, but Kai would be a sexy brat and he would smirk and lick his tongue up Lu Han’s member, maybe squeeze his thighs or his bottom with that weird motion he used to wave at Lu Han yesterday when he visited. His mouth, those thick lips, would cover his weeping erection and it would be so hot and so wet.

 

Lu Han didn’t really know what that would feel like though. All he had was Kai’s tank top and so he used that instead. He wrapped the white shirt over his member and used that to masturbate, letting his precum make a wet spot. He ran his other hand up and down the inside of his thighs, his fingers occasionally brushing over his entrance and he bit his lips. He was too afraid to take it that far, to add that level of want to his fantasy. He had never done it before, but he had the urge to, the urge to imagine Kai inside of him. With the thought, he felt the curling in his stomach let loose and he screamed silently, arching, hips jerking up as they rode out his orgasm.

 

Lu Han pulled the shirt away from his member and frowned as he saw the milky colored mess covering it. He threw the shirt down on the floor and leaned back with a sigh, staring at his ceiling. He felt guilty, not just because he had dirtied Kai’s shirt, but because he liked Kai, he liked his little brother’s friend a lot. 

 


	5. In Which My Brother Confesses

**Chapter 5 – In Which My Brother Confesses**

 

 

It was nine-thirty in the morning. School started at eight, but Lu Han’s first class didn’t start until eleven. I had to talk to him before school no matter what, so I got dressed that morning and then sat on the couch not wanting to wake him up. Or, more appropriately, just not wanting to be close to his room if I could help it. I was obviously late for school, but I didn’t care, this was more important than napping while the teacher rambled about stuff I didn’t care about.

 

Lu Han came down five minutes later. He had one hand under his shirt, scratching his abdomen and this other hand rubbed at his eyes. He yawned and blinked his eyes then jumped when he saw me there on the couch, arms crossed, glaring at him.

 

“Sehun! What are you doing, you should be at school. Don’t tell me you’re skipping.”

 

“I’m going in late,” I said and turned away from him, looking at the television, the screen black. “We need to have a family meeting, hyung.”

 

I could feel Lu Han looking at me confused. He moved across the living room and sat down on the couch, my backpack between us.

 

“What do you want to talk about, Sehun?”

 

I picked at a speck on my slacks and flicked it away. “Kai said he left his tank top here. Have you seen it?”

 

I could feel Lu Han stiffen beside me.

 

“What did it look like?”

 

“He said it was white, with a French logo on it. Have you seen it, hyung?”

 

Lu Han was silent for a bit. I scratched at my knee not sure what he would say.

 

“No. I can’t remember seeing a shirt that looked like that,” he said.

 

It hurt. He was lying to me and it hurt.

 

“Really, you haven’t seen it?”

 

Lu Han nodded and I turned to see him smiling, but his eyes didn’t look at me. “Maybe he missed placed it when he got dressed at home.”

 

Lying. I told him never to lie to me. When I saw him come home with bruises that he tried to hide from our mom and my dad, when I found him crying in his closet mumbling in Chinese, I told him never to lie to me. He promised.

 

“Let’s go check then,” I said and stood up.

 

“Check what?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Let’s go check your room. If it isn’t there than he just replaced it somewhere else.”

 

“Sehun, you have to go to school. Finding your friend’s shirt isn’t important enough for you to miss class.”

 

I reached out and grabbed Lu Han’s wrist and tugged him up hard. I looked him straight in his eyes. “Let’s go check your room, hyung.”

 

I kept a firm hold on my brother’s hand as I went up the stairs. He stumbled a bit behind me, but, otherwise, came along without much difficulty. I think he knew he was caught. Lu Han’s door was slightly opened and I kicked it the rest of the way pulling Lu Han in. I started by the bed, flipping pillows and throwing Lu Han’s blankets off his bed. It wasn’t there. I went to look around Lu Han’s desk and growled seeing Kai’s picture still on Lu Han’s computers. It was his background now, one with me and him in it.

 

Dirty clothes.

 

I went over to Lu Han’s dirty clothes basket and dumped it out, picking up every white article I saw to see if it was Kai’s shirt. Finally, I saw it buried under everything else. It was balled up and my hand paused over it, disgust building in my stomach making want to throw up. I picked it up between two fingers and it unraveled, some folds sticking together as if glued. I gagged thinking about what that glue was.

 

“What’s this hyung?” I asked as I stood up and held the shirt out in front of me.

 

“That’s…it must have…” Lu Han licked his lips as if searching for words to cover up what all of this really was.

 

“No,” I said. “No, I’ll tell you what this is.”

 

“Sehun.”

 

“It’s disgusting.” I rolled the shirt up and threw it at Lu Han’s face. “It’s disgusting!”

 

 The shirt landed on Lu Han’s face and he held his hands out, catching it as it slid down.

 

I kicked the pile of dirty clothes on the floor and then stalked over to Lu Han. “It’s disgusting, hyung. What made you think you could get off to my best friend?”

 

Best friend.

 

I called Kai my best friend.

 

Lu Han held the shirt to his chest and lowered his head. “I’m sorry. You weren’t supposed to know.”

 

“Then maybe you should have thought about locking your door. You’ve been acting weird lately, hyung. I come in your room and see you still working on the same picture of Kai since we took that photo shoot. It doesn’t usually take you two days to edit one picture. And now your background is him and don’t say something like Kai just happens to be in the picture and you wanted a picture of your dear younger brother because we both know you have plenty other pictures of me that don’t have a half naked Kim Jongin in the center.”

 

“Sehun, please,” Lu Han started.

 

“No hyung, no. Why would you do something like that? I never thought you to be sexual enough to masturbate with someone’s shirt…with my friend’s shirt. You have only met him twice, I don’t get it.”

 

“You wouldn’t get it, would you,” Lu Han said.

 

“What does that mean, hyung? What don’t I get? Aren’t we the same?”

 

“Not that…can’t I like him?”

 

“You’re four years older than him, it’s weird,” I pointed out.

 

“Is it really that weird? I thought so, too.”

 

Lu Han sighed and sat on his bed, still holding Kai’s soiled shirt. “I’m sorry Sehun. You weren’t supposed to know. I was just going to do this and then that was it, I would let it go. It’s troublesome for you, right, having your brother thinking about your best friend like this. I know that, Sehun. I know it’s disgusting, but is it really something that’s impossible?”

 

“What are you talking about, Lu Han hyung?” I asked.

 

“When I finally date someone, don’t you want them to be someone you approve of? Don’t you approve of Kai?”

 

“No,” I said and reached out, taking Kai’s shirt from Lu Han. I started for the door, but stopped when Lu Han started talking again.

 

“It’s not like he would like me back anyways.”

 

Like.

 

“If only that were true,” I said then left for school.

 

**형**

 

The secretary in the office had a hard time believing my story of why I was late. I stood there tapping my toe impatiently, waiting for her to finally make up her mind and give me an all clear. I would have even taken a detention if she would stop looking at me like that, her eyes judging from behind her tiny framed glasses. She finally looked away and licked the tips of her thumb and forefinger and started to flip through pages of some book she had been reading before I walked into the office.

 

“So, what you are saying Mr. Oh, is that you are three hours late to school, most of your morning classes already gone by, because you were having a family discussion with your brother?”

 

I nodded. “That’s right Ma’am.”

 

“Shouldn’t family discussions include all of the family?” she asked.

 

I gritted my teeth to keep from saying too much. “That is all my family, ma’am. My brother is my guardian; it says so in my files.”

 

The secretary studied her book then looked up at me, nails tapping on its cover. She clicked her tongue and grabbed a pin and her stack of passes.

 

“Fine, I’ll let it past this time.”

 

She quickly checked the necessary boxes and signed her name before handing me the slip. I took it and bowed.

 

“My files really do say that, though,” I said and then left.

 

I headed to class, the bell having rang a few minutes earlier. I could hear the teacher already starting his lecture, something about these guys fighting those guys and a war broke out. This teacher was usually pretty snippy, but I didn’t care right then, I had a pass. I opened the door and held the note out for him to take as I passed and headed straight for my seat by the window. Kai’s eyes were on me, I could feel them, but I didn’t dare look at him, just sat and waited for the teacher to move his attention away from me.

 

“It’s nice of you to join us, Sehun. Family emergency, eh, I suppose those happen,” he said then cleared his throat and continued on with his lecture.

 

I only listened to exactly three minutes of it, before turning my attention away. Three minutes was long enough for the teacher to think I was listening. I put my head on my hand and looked out the window. It was cloudy that day, I hadn’t asked Lu Han about the weather, but I figured he didn’t know since his brain was so preoccupied with Kai at the moment. I sighed and shifted where I was looking. I frowned. Kai’s reflection was visible on the window glass. He was looking at me between lines of his notes. When had he ever actually taken notes before? I remembered that until then, I had never seen Kai take notes. Actually, I never really knew what Kai did in class, I was usually asleep. Did he always take notes? We had had a test last week. He had dropped a journal on my head during break and told me to study, he had barrowed one of the girl’s notebooks. The handwriting though, the one he used now and the one in that notebook were the same.

 

Did he take notes for me?

 

Because we were friends?

 

I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t have to see his face and tried to nap. The bell rang for lunch and I jerked awake. Everything felt off. I usually slept three hours before lunch. I wanted to blame Lu Han, but really, I should have just napped on the couch or woke him up.

 

“Sehun.”

 

No, I didn’t want to talk to him. Go away.

 

“Sehun,” Kai repeated.

 

I groaned and turned around in my desk, looking at him through sleepy narrowed eyes. “What?”

 

“Are you okay? I thought maybe you were sick because of the rain yesterday.”

 

He looked worried. I didn’t want him to be worried about me. I turned away. “I was just talking to my brother.”

 

“About what?” he asked.

 

“Family stuff,” I answered. Family, that meant not him.

 

“Oh, okay…um, about yesterday,” Kai started.

 

I grabbed my bag and stood up. “I’m getting lunch.”

 

“Sehun, hold up,” Kai said and reached his hand out, grabbing my wrist.

 

I closed my eyes and licked my lips. I didn’t want to talk about this. I didn’t want to talk about this. I didn’t want to talk about this!

 

“Let’s talk about it.”

 

“Fine.” I sat back down.

 

Kai sat on my desk, looking down on me. I didn’t like it; I wanted to tell him to move.

 

“What I said yesterday…”

 

“You want me to forget about it?” I asked, a bit hopefully.

 

Kai shook his head. “I can’t forget about it and I don’t want you to either. Sehun, I really like your brother.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Why? Well, that’s a little hard to answer,” Kai said and rubbed the back of his head.

 

Hard to answer, huh? I glared at him.

 

Kai saw my expression and sighed. “Okay, um, well I like his…face. It’s cute, and just really pretty. He looks like a doll.”

 

I made a face. I didn’t want to listen to Kai talk about my brother’s face; I knew what he looked like.

 

“Right, and um…he’s really nice and he seems fun,” Kai said. “And like he is really gentle, I don’t really know him, though.”

 

“Exactly, you don’t really know him,” I said and got up again. What was Kai thinking saying he liked my brother when all he really liked was his face?

 

“I want to know him,” Kai said. “Just…just being around him, I feel weird. I was already curious because when you talked about Lu Han, you seemed really fond of him, you made him seem so perfect. I think he is perfect and the more I get to know him, the more perfect he will be. It’s weird and I didn’t think it would happen so soon, but I want to date your brother, Sehun. Let me get close to him.”

 

He was asking me permission? Did I have that power?

 

“No.”

 

Kai sighed. “Sehun, you really don’t understand. I need to get close to Lu Han.”

 

I glared at him. “Why, can’t you go date someone else if you want to date someone so bad? Is it really that important?”

 

Kai stared at me. His eyes were dark, it was like they were totally black, just pupil.

 

“It’s extremely important. I wanted my best friend’s approval, but if you won’t, it won’t stop me from dating your brother, Sehun. It’s his choice to say yes or no. You’ll be fine if he says no, right?”

 

If he said no it would be fine. I would just have a friend with a crush on my brother, a hopeless crush that would never blossom. But, it wasn’t hopeless.

 

I opened my school back and pulled out Kai’s soiled shirt from the trash bag I had stuck it in. I turned and threw it at him.

 

“Here’s your shirt back.”

 

Kai looked at the shirt quizzically before his eyes widened and he looked at me.

 

“S-sehun, this…” He was speechless and continued to look between the shirt and me then his face fell. “I can’t return your feeling, Sehun.”

 

I scoffed. “It’s not mine, Kai. You left your shirt in my brother’s room. I don’t approve at all.”

 

**형**

 

Chattering could be heard from down the hall. I hitched up my bag on my shoulder standing outside the elevator and sighed. I should have known Lu Han would bring his friends over today. He always wanted to be around them when he was upset and thought I couldn’t help. Usually it was with things that had to do with school since that was where they had all met. I couldn’t help with higher grade education since I was younger by a whole school. Was I not able to help him with this?

 

Easy, just don’t date my best friend.

 

The door was locked. I pulled my house key out, the little puppy charm Lu Han had gotten me for our first birthday together clinking against the doorknob. I tried to ignore the loud voices of the older boys in the apartment until my shoes were off.

 

“Did I hear the door open?” one of LU Han’s friends asked.

 

“It’s probably Sehun,” Lu Han said.

 

“I’ll go check,” said his other friend.

 

I turned around and saw a round face peeking out of the kitchen doorway. The face smiled and moved, followed by the rest of my brother’s older friend.

 

“You were right, it’s your brother,” the round hyung said calling back to Lu Han then looked at me. “Hey there Sehun, want to help us cook?”

 

Cook…and Lu Han was in there? I shook my head.

 

“Ah, come on,” he insisted. “There’s some food done already if you want to snack.”

 

Food.

 

“Alright, Boazi hyung,” I said and walked into the kitchen.

 

“Lu Han~, your brother called me Boazi, why is he using your stupid nickname for me?”

 

Lu Han was at the sink washing plates and bowls. His other friend, the younger of them, stood at the stove stirring something, an apron on. They both turned at the other’s whine.

 

“Because he’s my brother, that’s why,” Lu Han said then turned to me. “Haven’t I told you to call him Xiumin hyung?”

 

I just shrugged and walked over to Lu Han’s other friend to see what he was cooking. Some sort of stir-fry. It smelt good.

 

“Do you want to try?” his friend said holding a spoon of it out to me. He smiled a dimple on one cheek.

 

I nodded and leaned in only to get pulled back.

 

“Oh no you don’t unless you’re helping clean up.”

 

I frowned and sighed. I didn’t want to clean. I wanted to eat food than take a shower and go to sleep until the week was over with. Lu Han’s grip on the back of my blazer told me otherwise, and with our fight that morning, I thought it best to do something nice for him. I pulled off my blazer and put it on one of the stools on the bar in the kitchen and then rolled up my sleeves and took over Lu Han’s job of washing the dishes. The younger friend, Yixing, continued to cook, giving instructions to Lu Han and Xiumin until they had a feast laid out on the counter.

 

“This should last you two a week or two if you don’t eat like pigs,” Yixing said taking all the food to the living room so there was more room for us to sit while we ate.

 

I got stuck between Lu Han’s friends and frowned the whole time while I reached my chopsticks out to grab the best pieces of food before my hyungs. It wasn’t really necessary as they were more interested in chatting today. Usually, we all fought for food. My brother and his friends really loved food.

 

“So, why did you have me make this meal for you, Lu Han?” Yixing asked.

 

“We were getting low on food lately, and I was hoping to ask you to teach me to cook.”

 

Yixing choked on his kimchi. “Cook, you? I’ve tried that already, you burned your best pan.”

 

Lu Han’s face went red remember that incident and I laughed at him.

 

“If I remember correctly,” Xiumin said, “you vowed never to learn how to cook again. What’s the sudden interest now?”

 

“Well, I just realized what a bad brother I am,” Lu Han said.

 

I could feel his eyes on me when he said it and ended up having the piece of meat I was lifting off the plate fall back down.

 

“I’m sure Sehun here doesn’t think that,” Lay said and patted my back, hard, making me drop the meat again.

 

“Well, he might, but I do. Did you know he’s been having his friend’s older brother make his lunch? I can’t even make my brother lunch,” Lu Han said.

 

“You’re not his mom,” Xiumin said laughing a little.

 

There was an awkward air, but we all laughed along because he was right. Lu Han wasn’t our mom.

 

“That might be true, but still, you shouldn’t have to cook for your brother’s friend.”

 

“If you want Sehun to have a lunch, I can make more food for you guys,” Yixing said.

 

I didn’t want to hear anymore. What was Lu Han thinking? Was he trying to get on my good side? He didn’t need to. All he needed to do was not date Kai. I stuffed a bunch more food into my mouth ignoring Lu Han’s protests for me to eat slower, and got up, getting clothes and coming back down for a shower.

 

The water from the shower covered up most of the noise from the living room. Lu Han and his friends were always loud and there voices just sounded like incomprehensive mumbling now. When I decided I had had enough hot water scorching my body, I turned it off and climbed out of the shower. I dried off, humming a song to myself and began the usual after shower routine. I paused though, when the voiced from the living room got softer. I pressed my ear against the door.

 

“Lu Han, what’s the real reason you wanted us here. You always call us over randomly when something’s bothering you,” Xiumin said.

 

“You keep talking about Sehun and his friend. What’s up with that?” Yixing pointed out.

 

“Shh…wait until Sehun leaves,” Lu Han said.

 

Well, there went my option of going back out there and hanging with my brother and his friends, not that I was going to pick that. Unlike Lu Han, I didn’t think it was polite to hang around when your brother had friends over trying to chat them up. I sighed and pulled on my clothes then opened the door and headed up stairs.  I made sure to step on exactly the number of stairs there were in the stairway, but not in the same order, so Lu Han would think I had went upstairs, and then flattened myself against the wall out of Lu Han’s view to listen.

 

“He’s gone now, spill,” Yixing said.

 

I heard Lu Han let out a loud sigh. I could picture him bending over the chair, hands holding his small face.

 

“I’m the worse,” Lu Han said. “The absolute worse.”

 

“What are you talking about?”

 

“Xiumin,” Lu Han said, “what do you think about dating younger men?”

 

“As long as they’re not too young, why not?”

 

“I think it’s fine, why?” Yixing asked.

 

“You’re not gay,” LU Han said probably to Yixing.

 

“I’m tired of woman, I want to try for the other team, don’t leave me out of this conversation,” Yixing said.

 

“Fine, so if I liked a younger guy, it’s okay right?”

 

“How much younger?”

 

“Almost four years.”

 

“Where did you meet him?”

 

“That’s the real problem here. It’s Sehun’s friend.”

 

“You like your brother’s friend?” Yixing asked.

 

“Yeah, I’m horrible, right?”

 

“I want to see,” Yixing requested.

 

I heard Lu Han fiddling around and I supposed he pulled out his phone.

 

“Wow, yeah he’s kind of hot.”

 

“Do you want to see, Xiumin?”

 

“No, I’m not really interested.”

 

 “So what’s the problem?” Yixing asked.

 

 “He’s my brother’s best and only friend. How can I do that to Sehun?”

 

“You must really like him if you can’t say no,” Xiumin pointed out. “I know you were interested in a couple other guys, but you thought Sehun wouldn’t approve of them and decided not to do more than just friendly talking to them.”

 

“If Sehun was able to make friends with Kai, I think he would approve of him, but because they’re friends, it’s hard. I really do like him though. I just can’t get him out of my head.”

 

“We didn’t know you until after you were already alone with Sehun,” Xiumin said. “But, I have some advice. Don’t let something go that could be the best thing in your life.”

 

Lu Han laughed.

 

“That’s deep.”

 

“I’m the eldest; I’m supposed to be deep.”

 

“But Xiumin gege’s right. You have sacrificed so much to take care of Sehun, and before that, you’ve been through so much. You should do one thing that makes you happy. If they’re really friends then this Kai boy won’t dare to break your heart.”

 

“That’s if he wants to date me, too,” Lu Han said.

 

They started making jokes in Chinese and I had a hard time trying to understand what they were saying. Eventually, I just gave up and decided to go to bed.

 

My brother wasn’t going to give up on this and I knew Kai wasn’t either.


	6. And Then I Sneak Into Kai's House

**Chapter 6 – And Then I Sneak Into Kai’s House**

 

 

I decided to follow Kai home. Kai was weird for a while after the day I came in late, blushing every time our eyes met and we just kept apart from each other. I figured it would be weird to have your cum covered shirt thrown at you and to know that it had been used by your crush who happened to be your friend’s older brother. And your friend knew. It was definitely weird. I had the fleeting thought that he probably wouldn’t wash it; he would keep it and just make it double dirty. I wanted to gag. I really hoped he washed it…eventually at least. That couldn’t be hygienic. The decision came after the next day when Kai pretended like everything was fine again. He tried to talk to me, but I made up excuses to get away from him. He kept asking to come over to my house to ‘hang out’. I didn’t want him anywhere near my house until I could convince Lu Han that Kai wasn’t the guy he wanted to date. There had to be something about Kai that I could use to turn my brother off. And that was when I realized it. I had never been to Kai’s house and he always seemed reluctant to tell me anything about his family and wouldn’t let me visit. There had to be a reason. I was going to find it.

 

It was hard getting away from Kai after practice. He was unusually clingy and I had to make up the excuse that I need to use the restroom and he should go on ahead after he followed me into the bathroom. I waited until his footsteps left the bathroom before rushing after him keeping a far enough distance. I watched him from a good distance as he made his way to the bus stop we usually split at. He stood there for a while and then a bus came by. I always thought Kai got on the bus, but I was surprised when one of his brothers got off instead, carrying a large stick and a wrapped up sword – Tao. They bumped arms and then started down the road in the opposite direction toward where the shops near the school where. I followed curious if this was something that happened everyday.

 

Tao pointed at things and whined to Kai who just shook his head. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but eventually Kai stopped. They were in front of a flower shop. He motioned to his brother to go on ahead and went into the flower shop. I wasn’t sure who to follow anymore. How long was Kai going to take in the shop? What if I just kept following him around and he didn’t get home until midnight. The point of me doing this was to get to Kai’s house. I had his address which I had gotten from a girl from the student council in exchange for a favor, but it was in a place I had never been and I didn’t have money for a cab and I didn’t know which subway exit to get off on. Tao seemed like my best bet.

 

I followed Kai’s brother. He walked to the subway and got on one of the carts. I followed staying at the other end of the same cart. We seemed to stay there a long time and I wondered where we were going. Was I going to be able to get back home before midnight? Lu Han would get worried if I wasn’t home by midnight without a good reason – good reason being school or hurt. Finally, Tao rushed out of the stop and I had to fight a crowd to get out as well. I almost lost him, but saw the top of his wushu stick poking up through the crowd and followed after. When we made it into the light I looked around and noticed we were in a scarcely populated area. There was a forest, probably small, across the road and Tao walked right into it. I followed after feeling a bit freaked out now since it was getting dark out. It was like one of those horror movies from Japan.  Tao was going to turn around and break my head open with that stick of his, and then leave me on a tree hanging.

 

He didn’t, though; he just kept walking through the woods seeming completely unfazed until the outline of a western style house came into view. It was white with paint missing in a lot of places. The door was opened and a tall blonde guy in a long coat stood on the porch. I heard Tao squeal and run up the stairs, sticking himself to the man like he had to Kai the day I met him. I stayed behind a tree and watched them. The man seemed use to this and just patted Tao’s head and smiled at him fondly before offering saying stuff. I couldn’t read even a word on their lips and figured it was Chinese. The tall man must have been Kris; Kai had said he was the eldest and Tao’s real brother.

 

They disappeared into the house and I waited a bit before running to the house and creeping around it. There was an old white wood fence that blocked off the back of the house and I peeked around it to see Kyungsoo bringing a tray with drink out to a figure by a well. He was greeted with a kiss that made me stick my tongue out. They looked like my grandparents when they were still alive. Suho I guessed. They kissed again and I heard Kyungsoo say something about finishing supper and he went back inside. I hurried back toward the front only to stop under a window.

 

Moaning. I heard moaning. Two pairs. I looked up and got a glimpse of the silhouette in the curtain moving up and down, head thrown back and I blushed and moved away.

 

“Baekhyun, would you get off Chanyeol already, you’re supposed to be helping Kyungsoo with dinner,” someone yelled and I heard a groan then scrambling feet.

 

There was another call, it sounded like Kyungsoo, and I heard feet rushing down the top story of the house to the bottom. I followed them and peered through the window. It looked into the kitchen where they all sat around a large table messily eating the huge meal made for them by Kyungsoo. There were long benches on each side of the table then two chairs on each end. The six of Kai’s brothers were crowded on the benches and I wondered who the chairs were for. Their foster parents? Kai?

 

Was that it? Was that all that was weird with his family, missing parents and some of his brothers were sleeping together?

 

I looked up at the sky. It was almost dark, maybe another ten minutes until there wouldn’t be any sunlight at all. I sat on their front porch. Kai would come soon, right? He had just gone to get flowers.

 

**형**

 

I sat in the dark for a while before I finally pulled out my phone. I pressed a button seeing that my screen was black and groaned. It didn’t light up. My phone was dead. I needed to know what time it was. Where was Kai, I needed to go home? I stood up and started to walk toward the woods, but stopped between the first two trees I passed. Now... how long had I followed Tao through the trees? And in what direction?

 

“Hey, who’s out there?”

 

I turned around and saw Chanyeol walking down the steps. He looked confused at first until recognition brightened up his face and he grinned. I noted he had a really big smile, all teeth. His red hair was curly and sticking up here and there. He looked messy, a couple buttons out of place. My eyes roamed down and I saw his jeans unbuttoned. I looked away.

 

“Sehun, so it was you that followed Tao home?”

 

I looked back up surprised. “What?”

 

“Tao was blabbering something about being followed to Kris. We told him it was just a bear or something probably. Though you don’t have bears in Korea I think, at least not this far in the city. Maybe a Panda,” Chanyeol said beginning to ramble.

 

“No, no bears,” I said. “Sorry, I was just…Kai never invited me over and I was curious.”

 

Chanyeol shrugged. “It’s fine. I understand why Kai would want to keep you away. I mean…it’s not like this is the safest place for someone like you.”

 

Chanyeol’s face grew dark and I took a step back. I didn’t really understand what he meant. He surprised me when he went back to grinning.

 

“I mean, because of the woods and stuff.”

 

“You don’t mean it’s dangerous because of you?” I said and then grinned.

 

Chanyeol seemed surprised then I saw his cheeks go pink. “You saw, didn’t you?”

 

I nodded.

 

“It wasn’t what it looked like,” Chanyeol said, hands out in front of him.

 

“You weren’t having sex with one of your foster brothers?”

 

His eyes widened and then he sighed. “Okay, it is what it looked like but it’s not what it seems.”

 

“Hey I was okay when Kai told me about Kyungsoo and his boyfriend and I’m not in any position to judge.”

 

Chanyeol’s hand run up and down his opposite arm. He was grinning, but it seemed off, his eyes didn’t match. “We’re different from Kyungsoo and Suho.”

 

“Oh, I understand,” I said and turned away awkwardly.

 

“But, you know, Sehun, are you waiting for Kai or something? He sent us all a text that he was going to your apartment.”

 

My apartment? He went to a flower shop and then he was going to go to my apartment…”Shit.”

 

“You didn’t know?” Chanyeol asked.

 

I shook my head and flashed him my dead cellphone. “Battery died. I guess I didn’t get the text.” I turned back to the woods and stared into their deep darkness. I needed to get home.

 

“Oh, that’s right; you probably don’t know the way back. I’ll walk with you to the main road,” Chanyeol offered.

 

“Really?”

 

“Yeah, I’m not afraid of the dark,” he said flashing me a big grin before walking into the woods.

 

I followed behind and eventually moved in step with him. It really was dark now; I could barely see the trees yards in front of us, which was odd for a small forest in Seoul. Usually, I wasn’t bad with horror stories and movies and could get through horror games with minimum surprise screams when my brother bought them, but real life was different, and there was just something about these woods that set me the wrong way. I turned my head to Chanyeol to pull my attention away from the weird feeling.

 

Chanyeol had gotten a bit ahead of me. I moved a faster to match him noticing his long stride, but he seemed to me shortening them involuntarily, probably use to it with his other brothers around, but it looked like most of them were pretty tall, like Kai and Tao, and then that Kris guy. I think Kris was taller than Chanyeol, I was pretty sure he was, which made my initial thought that Chanyeol was tall lessen and I looked more at his facial features. He wasn’t grinning right now, just facing forward looking sort of peaceful. He had a small smile on his lips. He kind of looked like an elf, feminine. Elves belonged in the woods, right?

 

“What are you laughing at?” Chanyeol asked turning to me.

 

I didn’t realize I was laughing, but I could feel the tug of a smile on my lips and cleared my throat. “Nothing, just a thought. You’re kind of feminine, aren’t you?”

 

“Feminine? I’m taller than you,” Chanyeol said.

 

We both stopped and I looked him up and down. I didn’t have to tilt my head too much upwards. “Not by much.”

 

“I’ve always been called handsome,” Chanyeol said and started walking again.

 

“Handsome can be pretty,” I said and matched my steps with him.

 

“So, I heard you and Kai got in a fight,” Chanyeol said.

 

“Not a fight really, just an argument.”

 

I didn’t want t talk about Kai.

 

Something snapped somewhere in the woods and I stumbled a bit. No, talking was good, talking kept my mind off the fact we were in the dark woods alone.

 

“What did you argue about?” Chanyeol asked.

 

“Well,” this was what I didn’t want to talk about, but then again, maybe Chanyeol could talk some sense into Kai. “Kai, he likes someone.”

 

“He likes your brother,” Chanyeol confirmed.

 

“How did you know?”

 

“He basically told us all the way he kept going on about ‘Sehun’s pretty older brother’. It was kind of obvious how much he was crushing on him,” Chanyeol said and chuckled. “It’s cute, seeing him like this. We all wanted him to find someone.”

 

“Really, why, he’s only sixteen,” I said.

 

Chanyeol winced as if he had said something he wasn’t supposed to. “It’s just a culture thing. Kai’s a bit special.”

 

Special.

 

“But it bothers you, right?” Chanyeol continued.

 

I nodded. “Lu Han’s my brother. He’s my only family and Kai…he’s _special_. I’ve only known him for over a month, there’s still so much to understand about him as a friend, I can’t just give my brother to him.”

 

“Please don’t make Kai your enemy, Sehun,” Chanyeol said as he pushed back a branch that was hanging low.

 

I took it from him so he could pass by easily and ducked under it. “I don’t want to, but he wants to date my brother.”

 

“Well, aren’t there usually a lot of boys who have crushes on their friend’s older sisters?”

 

“The sisters don’t usually like the friend though, or they’re not serious about them, not until they’re both grown adults.”

 

“Are you saying Lu Han wants to date Kai, too?”

 

I frowned and fiddled with my bag strap. The silence was answer enough and Chanyeol walked a bit quicker.

 

“Doesn’t it bother you, having your brother with an older guy?”

 

“It’s only four years, Sehun, it’s not twenty.”

 

“But Kai’s underage.”

 

“Like I said, culture difference.”

 

“What would Kai feel, do you think, if one of you guys dated his friend? Would you ever date your younger brother’s best friend?”

 

We both stopped and Chanyeol turned to me and looked me up and down. His eyes were dark, but I figured it was just the lack of light in the woods. With a serious face, he really did look a lot more feminine.

 

“Maybe.”

 

Maybe.

 

Chanyeol moved through more trees and I stayed behind him this time until we finally got to the road. He pulled out his own cellphone to check the time. “The last train should be leaving soon; it’ll take you back home. Tell Kai to hurry back, would you?”

 

I nodded and quickly crossed the road.

 

Maybe.

 

And Kai was at the apartment with Lu Han and flowers.

 

**형**

 

A white rose petal lay on the ground outside our apartment door. I leaned down and picked it up, rubbing the velvety petal between my fingers. Maybe it was from the neighbors. There was a married couple a few doors down. I looked down the hall, but didn’t see anymore petals. There was really no denying it. I opened the door and walked inside, slipping off my shoes. I looked up and saw Kai and Lu Han in the living room. Kai sat on one end of the couch and Lu Han on the chair next to him. They were sitting close, heads almost bumping and I moved closer to them, floor squeaking under the pressure of my feet.

 

“Oh, Sehun you’re home,” Lu Han said looking up at me. His eyes were crinkly as if he had been laughing and he spoke with a smile.

 

“Where were you, I sent you a text saying I was coming over?” Kai asked.

 

“Phone was dead,” I answered and went over to where my phone charger was on the coffee table. I sat on the other end of the couch and plugged it in. “I was just out doing stuff.”

 

“Oh, well I’m glad you made it home before midnight,” Lu Han said. “I was starting to get worried.”

 

I turned to look at them. Lu Han’s left knee was touching Kai’s right, hand resting on their knees, finger twiddling as if wanting to reach out and hold the other’s hand. I wondered if they had been holding hands before I walked in. Had Kai already confessed? There was another white petal on the floor and I looked around the room before seeing the bouquet right in front of me on the coffee table. They were going to wilt if he didn’t put them in water soon. Lu Han wasn’t that great with plants either.

 

I stood and went into the kitchen, grabbing a long fancy glass and filled it with water. I came back into the living room and tried to ignore Kai’s and Lu Han’s small chatter, their giggling, as I unwrapped the flowers and put them in the glass, careful not to poke myself with any thorns.

 

“Oh, thank you Sehun,” Lu Han said and smiled at me.

 

I shrugged and stared down at the bouquet of white roses. I wondered why they were white and not red or pink or some other color. Maybe Kai was trying to make it not so obvious, but it was pretty obvious. What other reason did you bring a bouquet of flowers to a house of boys for? Lu Han wasn’t my mother, and you only brought roses to your best friend’s mother on white day or valentines, you brought other flowers over, non romantic flowers.  It was very obvious.

 

“What did you come over for, Kai?” I asked.

 

“I came to hang out,” Kai said and smiled proudly.

 

What was he proud of? I looked at Lu Han and he was smiling, too, his cheeks a little pink.

 

“No you didn’t.”

 

Kai’s face fell. “Sehun.”

 

“You already did what you came here to do, right? Then leave please, Kai. Go home,” I said.

 

“Sehun,” Kai repeated.

 

“Just go home and wash your shirt, Kai,” I said.

 

I could feel both Lu Han’s and Kai’s eyes on me. Finally, Kai stood up. I kept my eyes down, but I could see their hands in my peripheral. Kai grabbed one of Lu Han’s hands in both of his and leaned forward, whispering something to him then went toward the door.

 

“I’ll see you this weekend,” Kai said then left.

 

Lu Han cleared his throat. He moved a hand toward the roses, touching their blooms. “Sehun, I didn’t really expect him to come over like that. Wasn’t it nice of him to bring flowers, though?”

 

“You guys are so lucky I wasn’t here,” I said. I grabbed one of the roses out of the vase and sat on the couch, pulling it’s petals off.

 

“Sehun, stop that, those aren’t yours,” Lu Han said and took the rose away from me.

 

A left over thorn scratched my finger and I stuck the tip in my mouth. Lu Han put the flower back in the vase and moved the vase to the entertainment center.

 

“Sehun, are you mad?” Lu Han asked.

 

I took my finger out of my mouth. “Depends, what did you guys talk about?”

 

“Well…he asked me where you were and then he told me about that stunt you pulled which really, Sehun, what were you thinking throwing that shirt at him? I was going to wash it and that was going to be the end of it.”

 

I looked up at my brother. He had his hands on his hips glaring at me and blushing.

 

“Are you saying all of this is my fault?” I asked.

 

Lu Han shook his head. “No, it’s not like it’s a bad thing, just embarrassing, but you dug your own hole, Sehun. You basically told your best friend that your brother was masturbating to him…no, that’s exactly what you told him. You made me seem like a pervert. Lucky for me, Kai seems to be flattered with that.”

 

I gritted my teeth. “He confessed?”

 

“Yes. After we talked for a while about you he mentioned the shirt incident. I made a complete fool of myself trying to think of something to cover it and ended up just apologizing. Then he said he was honored and it was very awkward, but then he asked me out, so we’re going on a date Saturday.”

 

I stood up quickly. “You’re going to go on a date! You can’t do that.”

 

“Sehun, I have thought about it a lot and the only reason I can see for why I shouldn’t date Kim Jongin is because he’s your friend, but that it’s self is a reason I should. He’s a guy you trust, so I can trust him, too.”

 

But, I didn’t trust Kai. Not completely.

 

“Now, I’m not going to hear anymore on this, Sehun, we’re just dating right now, and we both care about you, so we won’t do anything that’ll make it more difficult on you, we’re just going on a date and I’m going to bed, it’s late.”

 

Lu Han turned and went upstairs. I glared after him then flopped down on the couch. A date. Just a date. Not if I could help it.

 

I picked up my cellphone and turned it on then dialed one of the emergency numbers Lu Han had given me.

 

“Hello, Yixing hyung, yes this is Sehun. How do you feel about stalking my brother on his first date?”


	7. In Which I Crash A Date

**Chapter 7 – In Which I Crash A Date**

 

 

Saturday we stood in front of the mall, all six of us, staring at each other. Lu Han stood across from me, arms crossed and glaring with Kai beside us who looked around nervously. I tried not to smirk seeing Lu Han’s friend and two of Kai’s brothers there as well. I knew when I called Yixing that he wouldn’t be able to resist weaseling his way into my brother’s first date with Kai since I learned he loved gossip. Kai had come up to me at school (I had been avoiding him all week for obvious reasons, and plus I had promised the girl from student council to eat lunch with her for the address though I ended up not using it) and tried to beg me to change Yixing’s mind. I told him I would, but I didn’t, and apparently he whined about it enough that his brothers decided to join along as well – Tao and Chanyeol.

 

“So, how are we going to do this?” Kai asked. “I had really only planned on two of us being here.”

 

“Aren’t you guys going shopping? I mean, we’re at a mall,” Tao said.

 

“It’s not much of a date is it?” Chanyeol added.

 

“Should have gone to a romantic lunch or seen a movie,” Yixing offered.

 

I could see both my brother and friend grit their teeth.

 

“We could have, but things had to be changed.”

 

“Well, since there’s six of us, how about we split up,” Yixing offered.

 

I wanted to strangle him. I didn’t not call my brother’s friend and listen to him squeal and gossip on the phone for three hours to let my brother have a peaceful date with my best friend. I glared at him.

 

Lu Han’s hand went to Kai’s wrist and I saw my friend smile happily at that.

 

“Kai and I are going off on our own, you guys do whatever, we’ll meet you for lunch,” Lu Han said.

 

“Um…but Lu Han, I don’t really…” Yixing trailed off and Lu Han dragged Kai away into the mall. He looked between the three of us left. “Well…Sehun…I think it’s you and—“

 

I turned and looked at Kai’s brothers. Chanyeol looked over at me curiously before his eyes widened and he nodded. He grabbed Tao’s wrist and pulled him forward.

 

“Yixing-ssi, right?” Chanyeol asked.

 

“Yes,” Yixing said and his eyes moved to Tao.

 

“This is our brother, Zitao, he’s Chinese and he likes shopping.”

 

“You like shopping?” Yixing asked seeming to get excited.

 

Tao nodded then was grabbed away from Chanyeol. “I like shopping, too. Do you want to shop with gege?”

 

“Will you buy me something?” Tao asked.

 

“I’ll buy you cake.”

 

Tao wrapped his slightly taller frame around Yixing and nodded. “I like cake.”

 

That left Chanyeol and I. I turned to the taller boy wondering how to ask him what I wanted.

 

“Well, if you want to stalk them, we should get going,” Chanyeol said and pushed on my shoulder to get me to start walking toward the building.

 

I looked back at him once then smiled and hurried inside.

 

Kai and Lu Han were already on the escalator to the second floor. I ran over to it and stepped onto it just as they were stepping off, Chanyeol a few steps below me. I turned my head this way and that when we reached the top and spotted Lu Han in a sports store looking at soccer balls probably rambling on about how he use to play soccer in China and how he won his team that game once in sixth grade with a torn shoe. I peaked at them from the window curiously, I saw Chanyeol just stroll right in and followed after him, and hid behind one of the soccer mannequins to watch them.

 

Kai smiled while Lu Han told his soccer stories that I had heard a hundred times when I tagged along with him and Xiumin when they went to play soccer on the weekends during winter. His eyes would widen here and there as if he was genuinely surprised by something Lu Han said. Maybe he was, maybe they didn’t have soccer in France.   

 

They went over to the hat section, and Lu Han pulled down a baseball cap and plopped it on Kai’s head. Kai looked up at it and took it off and put it on Lu Han’s head. The hat was a little big for my brother’s small head and Lu Han laughed and put it back on Kai saying something like ‘It looks good on you’. Kai stood a little taller and nodded and they moved to the shoe section. Lu Han picked up different sneakers. I could see him trying to stay away from the cleats since he had already bought new ones a month ago that he hadn’t worn yet.

 

“What about these?” Kai asked and he held up a pair of white sneaks…or where they scandals? They had a whole at the end for your toes, like plat formed sneaker scandals.

 

Lu Han burst out laughing and took the shoes from Kai, examining them. He stuck his hand inside and wiggled his fingers out of the whole and turned to Kai. Kai was pouting and took the shoes back.

 

“I like them,” he said.

 

Lu Han sobered up a bit. “They’re strange. Do you like strange fashion?”

 

“I saw people in France wearing them, rich guys.”

 

My brother reached out a hand and patted the wrist of Kai’s hand he was holding the shoes with, his long fingers around Kai’s bare wrist.

 

“If you like them that much, I can buy them for you.”

 

“I thought you were going to buy the hat.”

 

“I like the hat better.”

 

Kai put the shoes back and turned to Lu Han with a smile, brushing his hand against Lu Han’s. “Then I like the hat better, too. Let’s get to the checkout.”

 

Lu Han turned and Kai placed his hand on my brother’s lower back, almost on his bottom. I frowned as they walked to the counter and Kai pulled off the hat for it to be rung up, Lu Han adding on a little carton soccer player charm to the purchase then left the store.

 

Chanyeol walked past me and I saw him go for the shoes Kai had left and then went to the counter as well.

 

“Why are you getting those?” I asked.

 

“Kai likes this sort of thing, he just didn’t push that he wanted them to impress your brother. He probably would have come back and bought them tomorrow.”

 

“Why though, they’re kind of ugly,” I said raising a brow at the white scandal sneakers.

 

“He’s just odd like that. Rare and odd things attract him. He has a pink polka dotted back pack at home.”

 

I followed Chanyeol out of the store and we continued to stalk my brother and Kai as they went to a clothing store and then a stationary store and on and on. He liked rare and odd things, like my brother – A pretty half Korean half Chinese living with only his little brother.

 

I didn’t know this about Kai.

 

What else didn’t I know?

 

**형**

 

After two hours of following Kai and my brother around, it was time for lunch and we all met up at the food court. Lu Han practically dragged Kai to a two chair table off in the corner with a plate full of dukbboki and friend chicken. Chanyeol and I sat at a four chair table close to them. I put our plate of food down (hamburgers and hotdogs because Chanyeol insisted on eating American fast food because he hadn’t had any since leaving France and Kyungsoo didn’t allow it in the house). Chanyeol plopped our drink onto the table and sat to eagerly eat, taking huge bites out of his hamburger. I stood for a bit, slowly lowering myself into my chair. Lu Han and Kai were laughing and chatting happily. They poked toothpicks into the dukbboki and Kai offered his to LU Han. My brother leaned forward and took the rest strip of rice paste between his hips and into his mouth, grinning. Kai laughed and ate a piece Lu Han offered back. The red sauce smeared on his lips and Lu Han tried to tell him, but they were so giggly. My brother picked up a napkin and dabbed Kai’s lips. They both froze and they just stared at each other and slowly broke out into shy smiles.

 

“Sehun, you’re going to miss your chair.”

 

I turned my head just in time to see my bottom slip off the edge of the chair. I quickly caught myself on the table before my butt made contact with the food court ground and looked and stared for a second. Chanyeol looked at me with big curious eyes before a large grin grew on his face and he tilted back in his seat laughing loudly. I narrowed my eyes at him and pulled myself back up, sitting properly and picked at my hot dog.

 

“You should have seen yourself, just staring and staring at them, and your facial expressions. You should just leave them be before you hurt yourself,” Chanyeol said and took a big bite of his hamburger.

 

“It’s my brother,” I defended.

 

“I know he’s your brother, but Kai’s also your friend. I doubt they’ll take each other virginity on top of a food court table, so relax,” Chanyeol said.

 

My head snapped over to my brother and best friend. I didn’t like the image Chanyeol painted in my mind. Their heads were so close and I could almost imagine Kai reaching across it and grabbing the back of Lu Han’s head, pulling him in for a deep kiss and then pulling him onto the table…I shook my head. I didn’t need to think about their limbs entwining on the top of the table, it was disturbing. My brother was not allowed to have sex, no. Kai could…any…no he couldn’t that would mean he was cheating on Lu Han because Lu Han wouldn’t be allowed to.

 

Chanyeol waved his hand in my face. “Earth to Sehun. Quite obsessing over it, Tao and Lu Han’s friend are here.”

 

I turned away from my brother and Kai to see Yixing strolling over with his arms full of shopping bags, Tao behind him carrying lots of different snack like foods plus some stuff from the stalls. Yixing littered the floor with his bags and Tao put all the snacks down on the table where Chanyeol and I sat. Some of them rolled onto our trays and I pushed them back to Tao. They started sorting them, dividing them between each other and laughing, talking about which one would taste better.

 

I looked down at my hotdog that was now half a hot dog and half smushed mess. I lifted up the good part and took a couple bites before putting it back down. It tasted like the left over cafeteria food I always ended up with.

 

“Here, you can have these,” Chanyeol said offering me his fries.

 

“You sure? I thought you really wanted those. You made like this whole big spill about how much you wanted French fries.” I could remember his animated short speech when the clerk asked if he wanted fries with his hamburger.

 

Pink dusted Chanyeol’s cheeks and I was surprised. He shook the fries in his hand.

 

“Just take them, Sehun. I’m trying to be a good future brother-in-law.”

 

I took the fries and went back to watching my brother and Kai flirting, feeding each other. Not that I thought negatively about being related to someone like Chanyeol—though I didn’t really know him—it was more that I just didn’t want to think of my brother getting married, whether it be Kai or someone else. I didn’t want a brother-in-law; better yet, seven of them.

 

“Gege, let me try.”

 

I turned my head back to Yixing and Tao, sliding a fry into my mouth. Yixing had some kind of filled bun and was holding it out for Tao to try. Tao leaned forward and took a bite, humming happily and gave two thumbs up to Yixing. “It’s good!”

 

Tao picked up one of his snacks as well and opened it and offered it to Yixing. “Gege, you should try this one.”

 

I rolled my eyes when Yixing blinked then leaned forward and took a bite. “Why are you guys feeding each other, too?”

 

They both looked at me then over and Lu Han and Kai. Yixing leaned back in his seat and nibbled on the bread Tao had taken a bite out of.

 

“We’re not…” He shot a hand out and pinched Tao’s cheek. “He’s adorable, right? An adorable little brother.” Yixing turned his attention back to Tao. “You’re going to go shopping with gege often, okay?”

 

“Will you buy me Gucci?” Tao asked, eyes crinkled from being pinched.

 

Yixing pouted. “I don’t make enough money to buy brand names.”

 

“Then can I bring my brother along? He can buy us Gucci.”

 

“Will he buy me snack?” Yixing asked.

 

Tao nodded. “He’ll buy us anything; I just have to do this.” Tao lifted one of his fists to his fast and winked at Yixing before going. “Bbuing bbuing.”

 

Yixing’s cheeks turned pink before he burst out laughing and reached over the table to pat Tao’s hair. “Aw, you’re cute. I’ll feed you a lot of good food if you come live with me. You’re cuter then this kid here.” He pointed at me and I shoved three French fries into my mouth.

 

“I’m not trying to be cute.”

 

I suddenly felt a hand on the top of my head and looked up. Lu Han smiled down at me.

 

“It’s okay, little brother, I still think you’re cute.”

 

He tried to pinch my cheek but I moved away. “We’re going to go shopping for a bit longer, join when you guys are done.”

 

I stood up and wiped my mouth. “I’m done.”

 

I tried to ignore Lu Han’s eye roll. Chanyeol grabbed my wrist and pulled me back down in my seat. He leaned over the table and I felt his lips almost on my ears.

 

“Let them at least have an hour to themselves. You should have some fun here, too. Plus, you’re not about to waste my precious fries,” he whispered.

 

I frowned and settled back down, stuffing more fries into my mouth.

 

Kai and Lu Han waved at us before leaving to another store.

 

“Tao, do you want to come with gege? You can come to my apartment and I’ll make you cake since I promised you cake, right?”

 

I saw Tao nod and push a few snacks over to Yixing. Well, I suppose it was good for Lu Han’s friends and Kai’s brothers to get along if they were going to get married…….except Lu Han wasn’t allowed to marry.

 

After a while, Chanyeol and I got up and I started to scope around for my brother. I flailed around when Chanyeol suddenly dragged me into a music store.

 

“Stop looking for your brother and come here with me for a bit; I want to check out this store.”

 

I followed him to the back where the instruments were. There was a drum set out and Chanyeol ran to it like a little girl running to some huge stuffed toy. I followed after him, catching up when he was already seated. He grinned up at me and held out his drumsticks.

 

“Want to hear something cool?”

 

I shrugged wondering if maybe Lu Han and Kai were in the music store since they both liked dancing. My head whipped back to Chanyeol, though, when he suddenly started hitting the drum. I really wasn’t expecting it, the fast complicated rhythm he played on the drums. I wasn’t expecting the way he looked on the drums either, that serious but happy expression that I thought made him look feminine, pretty. His long body moved with his quick powerful movements and his hair swished back and forth. I hadn’t noticed earlier that it was straight for once. He finally stopped after a few minutes and his face contorted back into his usual happy gleeful look. One of his eyes was almost closed, crooked, it was strange, but I couldn’t help smiling back and I clapped.

 

“You’re right, I was cool>”

 

He looked at me surprised then smiled and stood up. “Did you have fun listening to it?”

 

“Yeah, I didn’t know you could play drums.”

 

“You don’t know a lot about me, Sehun, but its okay, we’ll get to spend more time getting to know each other, right?” He came over and wrapped an arm around my shoulder in a sort of hug.

 

I turned my head toward him and nodded. The drum thing was kind of cool. “I guess.”

 

He blinked and then pulled away, rubbing the back of his head. “Let’s go look at cds.”

 

 

**형**

 

 

Lu Han was surprised by the hand that grabbed his wrist before he could walk into the lobby of his and Sehun’s apartment building. He turned around to see Kai grinning at him.

 

“Tell them we’re going for a walk, hyung,” Kai said and he bit the bottom of his lips a bit, looking away.

 

Lu Han nodded, his face feeling pink and called out to Sehun. “Sehun, we’re going for a walk, you and Chanyeol go on up.”

 

His younger brother frowned and Lu Han could see Sehun about to protest. Lu Han sighed trying to think of a way to assure his brother it would be alright, just a walk in the park though he hoped it wasn’t, but when he looked up, Kai’s brother had already dragged Sehun to the elevators.

 

“Come on hyung,” Kai said and tugged on Lu Han’s wrist. Lu Han followed after him eventually walking in step with the younger boy who didn’t let go of his wrist.

 

They walked down the street and toward a park like that. Lu Han looked up at the sky and frowned seeing gray clouds begin to cover the blue sky from that morning. It felt cooler and Lu Han’s body shivered.

 

“Are you cold, hyung?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han shook his head but shivered again. He frowned when Kai’s hand dropped from his wrist but then smiled again when he felt Kai wrap an arm around his shoulders instead, pulling him close to the younger boy’s side.

 

“Are you warmer now?” Kai asked.

 

“Yeah.” And Kai was warm. Lu Han leaned his head on Kai’s shoulder and felt heat on the top of his head. He peaked up and noticed Kai’s pale gold cheeks dusted with a rose pink. He reached a hand up and poked his cheeks.

 

“You’re blushing Kai.”

 

Kai glanced down at Lu Han, but looked away again. “No I’m not.”

 

Lu Han poked his other cheek. “Yes you are.”

 

Kai sighed then smirked at him. “Fine, but what do you expect? Your cute face is so close to mine.”

 

Lu Han pursed his lips, trying to look offended in an attempt to make the pink of his own cheeks go unnoticed. Being this close to Kai’s face made him feel flushed, too. His jaw line was perfect, not too straight and not too long, a fine forty-five degrees. The front of his side profile was pretty; there was a flatness to it interrupted by the curve of his handsome nose and those plump lips. And his dark eyes. Lu Han wanted to stare into them for days if he could, they were so dark.

 

Kai glanced down at Lu Han again, a gleam in his eye as if he knew Lu Han had been staring at him, admiring him. Lu Han moved his head away and focused on walking, not stepping on Kai’s shoes as they walked so close together. He had confidence in his balance, but clumsiness always seemed to befall him at the strangest of times and walking with his boyfriend was not one of the times he wished for bad luck to befall him.

 

“Did you enjoy today?” Kai asked.

 

“Hmm, well,” Lu Han thought.

 

They had gone around the stores and just talked and played and bought a few things. He had been worried when he found out there would be four tag alongs to his and Kai’s first date, but it didn’t turn out so bad.  He was quite grateful to Kai’s brothers. Lu Han had been so worried when he couldn’t talk Yixing out of tagging along and was happy when Kai said it was fine, he’d work something out. Tao had been able to keep Yixing busy and Lu Han barely saw a hair of his friend except at lunch time. They had even left before them, Yixing sending a text that stated he was taking Tao to his apartment to cook him a cake. He hadn’t really expected it, but Lu Han was happy his friend had found someone to keep him busy after breaking up with his girlfriend, and it was always nice to meet someone with the same descent at you. The real problem had been Sehun. He had known his younger brother was following them the whole time, but he was impressed with Chanyeol’s sly ways of getting his younger brother’s attention. A few times Lu Han caught himself looking over to where Sehun was to see if he was alright and he would see him actively talking to Chanyeol. That morning had been the first time Lu Han had met both boys and he hadn’t been sure what to make of them. One looked scary, dark eyes, dark hair, black around his eyes like a panda and the other tall and just oddly pretty, but he decided they were good boys.

 

And they let Lu Han have a fun first date with Kai.

 

“Yeah, it was definitely fun.”

 

“I’m glad. I was worried since we were just going to the mall. I could have thought of something more romantic. Do you want to swing?”

 

Lu Han nodded to the empty swing set Kai was pointing at. He sat down in one and Kai beside him. “It was fine, I don’t dislike shopping. I should be apologizing to you, though, for my brother. I’m pretty sure it was his idea to get Yixing to tag along.”

 

Kai chuckled and shook his head, His dark brown hair swished with the movement and his straight fringe took on a slanted position when he turned his head to look at Lu Han when he talked. “You shouldn’t apologize. He’s my friend, too.”

 

Lu Han laughed and began swinging lightly back and forth. “I guess you get to take me somewhere more romantic for our second date.”

 

“You want to go on another date with me?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han paused in his swinging and nodded. “I want to go on a lot of dates with you, Kai.”

 

He heard the rattle of the swing chains and looked up to see Kai stand and walk behind him. Kai started to lightly push him on the swing.

 

“You really do like me then?”

 

“Yes…I mean you’re the one that got their shirt covered in cum thrown at them,” I said bowing my head in shame at the thought.

 

Kai laughed. “Yes, that was surprising. I should thank Sehun for that; I would have never guessed you had those feelings for me if it wasn’t for Sehun. I wouldn’t have even had the guts to ask you out.”

 

“Yes well, I did tell Sehun he was at fault for us being together right now.”

 

“I’m sure he learned his lesson not to throw shirts covered in his brother’s semen at boys. They’ll desperately want to date his brother and kiss him.”

 

“Kiss?”

 

The swing slowed and Lu Han reached his legs out to bring it to a stop. He tilted his head back and saw Kai’s face leaning over him, smiling down. He looked like the sun like that, gold skin and bright smile. The sun radiating through the silver clouds above. He wanted to be kissed by those sunrays.

 

Slowly, Kai’s smile slipped away and he moved down ever closer, his head tilting slightly only centimeters away from Lu Han’s face. Lu Han gasped softly when Kai’s plump pink lips touched his. They were soft, but he could feel a bit of skin prickly against his own lips where they were chapped possibly from biting. Lu Han decided he liked it anyways. It was the most perfect kiss he had ever had not that he hadn’t been kissed before, mostly girls in middles school, but there had been a couple boys that shared his mouth in high school though wouldn’t dare tell Sehun about that. Lu Han reached one hand up, entwining it in Kai’s dark hair and pulling him down to make their upside down kiss deeper, but only lips,

 

Eventually, Kai pulled away and Lu Han’s hands fell loose of his hair. Lu Han took a quick glance around to make sure no one had witnesses their kiss and leaned back when he felt heat radiating into his back from Kai’s chest and stomach.

 

“We should go back now,” Kai said, moving around the swing. He held out a hand to Lu Han.

 

Lu Han sighed and nodded. Sehun would get restless soon. He reached out and took Kai’s hand, sliding away from the swing. Kai didn’t let go of his hand though, Lu Han noted once he had made sure he was all situated (no wedgy from the swinging). Lu Han was more than happy when halfway there Kai intertwined their fingers as well and he got to hold his boyfriend’s hand all the way home.


	8. And Then Lu Han Comes To School

**Chapter 8 – And Then Lu Han Comes To School**

 

 

The start of the next week was filled with me finishing my promised week eating with the student council girl. She chattered about things that I didn’t much care for and I figured she had a crush on me since she put up with my passive responses when I took the time to give one. By Thursday, I my time using her as an excuse for spending long hours in Kai’s presence was up. I sat in my desk, watching the reflection of the clock in the back of the room in the window, the hand ticking the seconds away. The minute hand finally landed on the twelve and the school bell chimed the hour making me cringe.

 

A hand landed on my shoulder and I swallowed hard, peaking into the reflection of the window. Kai stared back at me, a grin tugging the corner of his mouth.

 

“You’re going to eat with me today, right Sehun?” he asked, but by the way the pads of his fingers pressed into my shoulder I knew I didn’t really have a choice in my answer.

 

“Y-yeah,” I said and Kai moved his hand away.

 

I stood and shouldered my bag, following Kai out of the classroom. It was inevitable that I would have to eat with Kai again. Before he was my brother’s boyfriend, he was my friend, and even if he hadn’t been my friend, he was still my brother’s boyfriend so I was inclined to get along with him.

 

I realized I didn’t have much of a choice when it came to getting long with Kai after he started dating my brother. Lu Han practically waltzed into our apartment that weekend. Chanyeol and I had taken to playing video games as we waited for Kai and Lu Han to return (Chanyeol’s idea since I was perfectly content with waiting in front of the door until they came back or even outside in the hall). His cheeks were flushed a light pink and he was all smiles as he greeted us. He told Chanyeol that Kai had gone home already, but he could catch him if he wanted to walk with him, but Chanyeol stayed and played video games with me for a while longer, winning, because I was too distracted by my brother’s weird behavior. He was like a love struck girl, twirling about the living room and humming as he fixed things that didn’t need fixing. He went into the kitchen and came back out with a plate full of cookies and two glasses of milk for Chanyeol and I. He stole my glass and dunked a cookie into it then took a bite out of it and put the bitten cookie in my hand and ruffled my hair as he went upstairs. I had just stared scared and confused at Chanyeol who looked about ready to laugh. He shrugged and grinned and I heard the end music from the game telling me I had lost for the fifth time since Lu Han got home.

 

Later that night, I had confronted Lu Han about his weird behavior (it had continued after Chanyeol left, Lu Han had gone to the bubble tea shop and brought me back one even though I had had one at the mall with Chanyeol and he had seen me drinking it). Lu Han sat at his computer going through pictures of Kai again. He was in some sort of drawing program and was adding hearts and angel wings to his pictures…maybe not, I couldn’t really see what he was drawing, but by the look on his face I would have guessed he was. After a few minutes of calling his name, Lu Han had turned to me. He didn’t even let me ask him my question; he just began to babble about his time with Kai. The first part I already knew since I had stalked Kai and him through the mall, but I listened to the pars that happened after.

 

“We walked until we reached a park,” Lu Han had explained. “We just walked and he had his arm wrapped around my shoulder and I just stared at his face. Kai really has a handsome face, you know. We sat on the swing and I wanted to hold his hand so bad, Sehun. Like little school children, I wanted to hold his hand on a swing, but he got up and pushed me. And we talked, I don’t even remember what we talked about, but it was cute. He said cute things and then made the swing stop and we kissed. Upside down, on the swing. Oh, I bet it was a really cute kiss, I would have liked a picture of it.”

 

Kiss.

 

My brother and Kai had kissed.

 

I knew it wasn’t my brother’s first kiss and I didn’t expect that it was Kai’s either, but still the thought stung like it had the first time Lu Han had been kissed.

 

His fingers played on his lips often after that. I caught him occasionally staring off into space either on the couch or in the kitchen, just running his fingers over his lips, sometimes a giddy smile tugging at them. I wasn’t going to bring it up around Kai, the kiss, but I was happy for the excuse not to see him after the initial shock. However, it couldn’t be avoided know.

 

Kai eventually got tired of my lagging feet and grabbed my wrist pulling me into the cafeteria. He didn’t carry any food with him and pulled me right past the lunch line so I wondered what we were going to eat. I froze, though, when my eyes landed on our usual spot.

 

“Come one, Sehun,” he said.

 

“What happened to my table?” I asked staring at the empty place near the trashcan where my broken table use to sit.

 

Kai looked there as well and clicked his tongue. “Well, I was sitting there last week, but Chanyeol got tired of me sitting alone and forced me to sit with him and my other brothers. I guess not seeing us there for so many days; they finally got rid of the table.”

 

“So where are we supposed to eat?” I asked.

 

Kai pulled me along and lead me toward a table where three other boys were already sat. Chanyeol moved a hand to wave at me. I frowned.

 

“We’re sitting with your brothers?”

 

**형**

 

All it took was for Kyungsoo to slide my lunch box to me to get me to sit down at the large lunch table. Kai and I sat together at the end where Tao sat, Kyungsoo and Chanyeol on the other side. I immediately started eating after a quick thank you to Kyungsoo and started scarping down the tender juicy meats and vegetable and rice stir-fry. I missed Kai’s brother’s food so much. The student council girl made me a lunch, but it was simple and girly and, though filling, couldn’t compare to this. I heard a low chuckle and looked up.

 

“You look like you have been starving for days,” Kyungsoo said.

 

I wiped my mouth and took a sip of the first drink I saw which happened to be Kai’s banana milk. He glared at me.

 

“I like your food.”

 

Kyungsoo reached out and patted my hair. “You’re adorable; I’ll keep cooking for you then.”

 

I smiled a bit at him. Kyungsoo seemed nice, motherly, and I remembered Kai said they called him ‘Umma’ sometimes.  

 

“Should I learn to cook, too?” Chanyeol asked.

 

Kyungsoo, Tao, and Kai all looked at him wide eyed and said in unison, “No.”

 

Chanyeol pouted and I tried not to laugh at him. “Why not?”

 

“You’ll burn it,” Kyungsoo said.

 

“I’m not a bad cook,” Chanyeol protested.

 

Kyungsoo gave him a pointed look. “You get too excited.

 

Chanyeol stopped protesting after that. He jumped suddenly when a slender hand landed itself on his shoulder. My eyes ran up their hand to the yellow sleeve of their uniform jacket and I blinked at the vaguely familiar face smiling down at Chanyeol and then to the rest of us. It was a boy, a pretty boy with pale skin like mine and he wore eyeliner around his eyes, thick. His hand moved up Chanyeol’s long neck and tangled into his orange hair before he took a seat beside him, ending up in front of me. I moved my eyes away from him to Chanyeol who seemed uneasy suddenly.

 

“Hey guys,” he said.

 

“Baekhyun, are you eating with us?” Kyungsoo asked.

 

Baekhyun, Kai’s brother I hadn’t seen much of yet, the brother Chanyeol was sleeping with. I finally understood why he seemed quiet now. I could feel the awkwardness, but I wasn’t really sure why it was there. Baekhyun continued to play with his hair despite the obvious feeling.

 

“You know I can’t really eat things like that right now. I’m trying to feed another way,” he said and smirked. His eyes moved across the cafeteria behind me and I took a peak. At a table close to the wall was a guy in Harry Potter style classes, he had a chiseled chin and looked to be reading a music book.

 

“So that’s your target this time, eh?” Kai asked. He was also looking over his shoulder. “I didn’t know you liked the musical nerd types.”

 

“He plays soccer, too,” Baekhyun said.

 

New target? Types? I looked back at Chanyeol. He was picking at his food. I understood, his sex friend was looking for a real partner.

 

“Haven’t you already gotten him?” Kai asked. “You weren’t home Friday night.”

 

Baekhyun winked at Kai. “He’s just shy about it. But you know,” Baekhyun finally pulled his fingers out of Chanyeol’s hair and folded his hands together, long fingers coming together like a puzzle, and he put his chin on his hands, looking at Tao, “I wasn’t the only one that didn’t come home a night this weekend, or should we say two nights.”

 

They all looked toward Tao as well and I looked at him, too, curious about what they meant. Tao had a piece of meat half way to his mouth when he looked up at all of us. If dropped from his chopsticks and he frowned as it splat back into his dish then looked back at us.

 

“What?”

 

“Zitao, you didn’t come home until early this morning,” Kyungsoo said. “Where were you all weekend? You went with Chanyeol to go with Kai on his date. If anyone wasn’t going to come home I thought it would be Kai.”

 

I stared at Kyungsoo and it took him a few moments to realize what he had said and he looked at me, his eyes larger than normal then his mouth went in an o. “Oh, oh Sehun, I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t think your brother’s loose enough to sleep with Kai on the first date or anything…sorry.”  
  


I just rolled my eyes and took a few bites of food. I didn’t know Tao hadn’t gone home after the date.

 

“Well, Baekhyun hyung’s not the only one that can get laid, is he?”

 

They all seemed surprised by that and I looked up in time too see Tao smirking before he went back to eating his lunch.

 

“It would seem like he’s not,” said another voice.

 

I turned and jumped seeing my brother there standing behind Kai. Kai tried to look up to see who was talking behind him, but Lu Han had his hands over Kai’s eyes.

 

“Guess who,” Lu Han said.

 

Kai lifted his hands up and placed them on Lu Han’s. “My boyfriend,” he said then tilted his head up, smiling.

 

I made a gagging sound and Lu Han shot me a glare.

 

“What are you doing here?” Kai asked Lu Han.

 

My brother moved to sit beside Baekhyun, facing Kai. “Did Sehun not tell you? My school gave me an internship here until Christmas. I’m going to help the photography club out; I have to be here after lunch on Thursdays.”

 

“I forgot about it,” I said truthfully. Lu Han had said something about it over a month ago. He probably said something again when I was napping, or I ended up napping when he was talking about it.

 

“Oh, you’re our Jongin’s boyfriend?” Baekhyun asked turning to Lu Han. “You’re really pretty.”

 

Lu Han smiled and laughed a bit shyly. “I guess that’s how it is now. You’re pretty too, one of his brothers?”

 

“Yep, I’m the third eldest, Baekhyun.”

 

Kyungsoo reached across the table to wave at Lu Han. “And I’m Kyungsoo.”  
  


“Oh, the one that makes my brother lunch. Thank you so much for that, I’m really hopeless when it comes to food.”

 

Kyungsoo laughed. “Then it’s good you met Kai, I’ve been teaching him how to cook for a long while, ask him to cook for you and your brother one day.”

 

I looked at Kai. “You can cook?”

 

Kai shrugged. “A little bit.”

 

If Lu Han wasn’t going to do it, I would, and he’d have to cook because I would use my younger age and boyfriend’s brother status to make him.

 

“But, anyways,” Baekhyun said, “do you know where our Tao spent the weekend?”

 

“With my friend,” Lu Han said and sighed. “He tagged along with Sehun on our date and those two just clung to each other. He recently broke up with his girlfriend for six months, so I was a bit worried when he called me and said he slept with you, Tao. You’re okay, right?”

 

Tao had his chopsticks in his mouth. He pulled them out curiously and nodded. “I’m fine; he’s the one that probably hurts. He said it was his first time with a guy.”

 

“Oh, Tao topped,” Chanyeol pointed out.

 

They all nodded in some kind of understanding.

 

Kai suddenly stood. “Hey, Lu Han, walk with me? I want to show you something.”

 

Lu Han looked up at him and then nodded, smiling. I tried to stand up, took, about to invite myself along, but Kai’s hand on my shoulder stopped me. He gave me a quick pleading look and I scrunched my face up at him, huffing. Lu Han walked around the table and ruffled my hair before following Kai out of the cafeteria.

 

“I think they’re going to have a quickie in the bathroom,” Baekhyun said.

 

I glared at Baekhyun.

 

**형**

 

As soon as they were out of the cafeteria and in the empty school halls, Kai reached out and took Lu Han’s hand. Lu Han smiled at Kai and he could feel his cheeks tinge pink when the younger boy enlaced their fingers together and started to lead Lu Han down the hall.

 

Lu Han hadn’t gotten to see much of his younger boyfriend since their first date. Kai had left him in an empty hall in the lobby area of his apartment with a quick kiss and a reluctant farewell. They had texted though, short messages sometimes compiled of only emoticons, smiley and cute faces sent back and forth. Lu Han hadn’t thought Kai would be the cute type, but he was happy that he had been wrong. When Lu Han finally got a boyfriend, he thought he would have to rein in the feminine tendencies he had at times, the want for a cute silly relationship. He thought it would just be hanging out and sex, Maybe it would be that, but with cute messages and random bouquets of white roses.

 

“Your bouquet is still alive,” Lu Han said. He was quite proud of himself for keeping the white flowers alive. Only one had died, the one Sehun had been picking at, but another was beginning to wilt and he thought it was coming close to their time.

 

“Oh, really, I can get you more when they finally die,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han nodded. “I would like that. They’re really pretty; we don’t really have that kind of thing in our place.”

 

Flowers. Those were something a mom would have.

 

Kai nodded and turned a corner. Lu Han looked ahead and saw signs indicating the restrooms up ahead sticking out from the wall. He hadn’t been expecting to be pulled toward the signs and inside.

 

“Did you have to pee?” Lu Han asked and jumped when he heard the boy’s bathroom door lock. He turned to see Kai leaning against the door, looking down, a shy impish grin on his lips.

 

“Sorry hyung, I just wanted some time with my boyfriend,” he said and leaned off the door starting for Lu Han.

 

Boyfriend. Lu Han smiled hearing the word, a sort of fluttering in his stomach erupted every time he thought about it and how it was associated with the younger boy.

 

“Did you really have to lock us in the bathroom for that?”

 

Kai was only a couple steps in front of him and Lu Han took a step back, holding his hands behind his back.

 

“Yeah, I did. I don’t want anyone interrupting us.”

 

What were they going to interrupt? Lu Han wondered. He didn’t get a chance to ask before Kai’s face was in front of his and his lips on Lu Han’s. With Kai’s plump and full lips pressing against his own, Lu Han melted instantly. Kai’s hands framed his face, holding it gently as his lips began to move roughly and inexperienced against his own. Lu Han placed his hands on Kai’s hips and tilted his head a bit to help guide the younger boy into a smoother kiss. Kai had said he had been kissed before, but never seriously or of his own doing. Lu Han said he had though only with girls. He knew how to lead a kiss, but he wondered if he could teach someone else to lead. He wanted to be led.

 

Wet and hot, Kai’s tongue licked against Lu Han’s bottom lip and he parted his mouth in greeting, not fighting against Kai’s tongue as it slipped inside. He moved his arms farther up on Kai, holding tight to his upper back, and held Kai as the force of the kiss made him take more steps back until he was pressed against the edge of the sink. Kai’s tongue moved like worm inside Lu Han’s mouth and the older wanted to laugh at Kai’s excitement and neediness. He tugged on his shirt to get Kai to slow down and moved his own tongue with Kai’s, slowly urging him to follow – like a snake, deliberate movements, striking out at just the right spots, feeling with heat.

 

Lu Han moaned when Kai finally got the hang of it, adding in nips to Lu Han’s bottom lips when Lu Han pulled away for air. Kai slid his lips along Lu Han’s jaw and then down his neck. It surprised Lu Han, the touch of Kai’s plump warm lips on his neck sent shivers through his body and he moved one hand to Kai’s hair, tugging the dark locks as he leaned back against the mirror. He just couldn’t catch his breath, though, his chest heaved fast and he felt light headed. His neck felt wet, Kai’s tongue licking spots, rough like a kitty, a very large kitty, like a panther. He hissed when he felt something pierce his skin. Kai was a biter. Lu Han never thought he would enjoy biting, he thought it would hurt, but Kai’s teeth held tight against his skin as he sucked and licked made Lu Han shiver over and over and he wondered if he would come, hoping he wouldn’t. He tugged hard on Kai’s hair to get him to stop whatever wonders he was doing to his neck, his other hand digging fingernails into Kai’s back. Kai finally moved away, placing more kisses on Lu Han’s neck, sucking on some spots to decorate Lu Han’s neck further.

 

“Kai…you’re really something else,” Lu Han said, leaning against the mirror, sitting on the sink to regain himself.

 

Kai moved his face away from his neck so it was just a few centimeters in front of Lu Han’s face. “What? You didn’t like it?”

 

Lu Han laughed and ran a hand through his hair, finding drop of sweat under his bangs. He turned his head to look in the mirror and widened his eyes. He trailed his fingers along the red marks on one side of his neck and frowned. “You really outdid yourself, Kai. Was all this necessary?”

 

Kai looked at Lu Han’s reflection from over his shoulder. He touched the marks as well and smirked. “I like your neck. It was so pretty and white; I’ve wanted to leave marks on it since I first saw it hyung.”

 

Lu Han clicked his tongue, but smiled anyways feeling flattered. “You’re silly, Jonginnie.”

 

“Jonginnie? Is that my new nickname?” Kai asked and leaned in placing a kiss on the clean side of Lu Han’s neck.

 

He couldn’t help but tilt his neck to give Kai more clearance to his skin and moaned softly. “I’ll use it sometimes. You should stop, I can’t go around having both sides of my neck marked up, and I don’t think I have enough concealer for that. I’m going to have to go shopping with Yixing for makeup since my boyfriend likes to mark me.” He turned back around to face Kai directly and wrapped his arms around Kai’s shoulders.

 

Kai wrapped his arms around Lu Han’s waist and grinned, shamelessly proud of his work on Lu Han’s neck. He leaned forward and kissed Lu Han sweetly.

 

“Kai~ we should go,” Lu Han said against the younger’s lips.

 

Kai moved away and put his hand in Lu Han’s, helping him off the sink. “We should, before Sehun bursts in here.”

 

They walked out of the bathroom and Lu Han leaned up to place a kiss on Kai’s cheek before running off to setup for his first day of internship. 


	9. In Which I Try To Stalk Kai Again

**Chapter 9 – In Which I Try To Stalk Kai Again**

 

 

I grunted feeling the added weight flop down on me as I watched my weekend cartoons. I brought my hands up and held my brother’s head on my chest, playing with the mess of light brown hair on his head. He sighed and nuzzled into my chest then sighed again.

 

“Hyung, you’re heavy,” I said finally looking away from the television to look down at my brother.

 

“Be quiet and be a good pillow, Sehun,” Lu Han said. He dug his chin into my sternum and glared up at me.

 

I moved my hands from his hair and put them on his face, squishing his cheeks until he resembled a fish and turned his head back toward the television. “Just watch TV, it’s too early to talk.”

 

Lu Han patted my thigh. “Good pillow.”

 

I rolled my eyes and watched the last ten minutes of my cartoon while Lu Han napped on me. It was the usual schooless morning, both of us waking up earlier than we would have liked and coming down to watch television, stacked on top of each other until noon.

 

“Why do you like this cartoon?” Lu Han asked when it finished.

 

“Because I do,” I said. It was a kid’s show, but it was mind numbingly entertaining, exactly what I wanted when my brain was still sleepy. Plus, there was a character, a deer I think, that reminded me of Lu Han, but I wouldn’t tell him that.

 

“Let’s watch a movie, Sehun,” Lu Han said.

 

“Get up and put one in then.”

 

“You do it,” Lu Han said.

 

“You’re on top of me, so you do it,” I protested.

 

“I’m too comfortable~.”

 

“How am I comfortable?” I asked. “Wouldn’t Kai be more comfortable?”

 

“Kai?”

 

I wanted to hit myself for bringing Kai up so early in the morning. I was hoping for a Kai free weekend.

 

“I don’t know if Kai would be more comfortable, I’ll tell you when I find out,” Lu Han said and I could hear that tinge of teasing in his voice. He wanted to make me mad. Of course I would think of my brother laying on Kai while they were both naked post sex, but then they could just be cuddling too, just like we were now, to know if Kai made a good pillow.

 

“I don’t really like the idea of you two cuddling.”

 

“I didn’t say we were going to cuddle,” Lu Han said.

 

“Don’t hint at having sex with my best friend, it’s hard enough talking to him normally now that you two are dating.”

 

“Sorry,” Lu Han said and pouted.

 

I just shrugged and watched the television. Some boring show, I think it was the news, was on. Lu Han suddenly started to laugh hysterically, giggling against my stomach.

 

“What?”

 

“Your stomach is making weird noises, it sounds funny.”

 

“Maybe it’s because you’re pushing down on it. Get off, I want to get breakfast.”

 

Lu Han finally got off of me and sat at the other end of the couch. I stood up and stretched before making my way to the kitchen. I pulled down a huge bowl and the box of cereal and milk. I emptied half the cereal box into the bowl and poured too much milk into it then took two spoons out of the drawer. I let the crunchy pale colored cereal pieces soak for a few seconds, counting the colorful marshmallows floating around then started to shovel huge spoonfuls into my mouth. LU Han entered the kitchen a few minutes later. He lazily walked by me, headed to the fridge. I held out my other hand with the second spoon to him. He paused and took it with a smile, sitting on the other side of the bar and we shared the large bowl of cereal in silence.

 

I felt something hit me in the face and looked up. Lu Han took a big mouthful of cereal, eyes looking at me with pure innocence. I looked at him suspiciously and went back to eating before I felt something else hit my face and stick there. I reached up and pulled a marshmallow off my cheek. I frowned at Lu Han.

 

“Hyung, stop flicking cereal at me, we don’t have a lot left and that’s wasting it.”

 

Lu Han laughed and ate another spoonful. “Are you lecturing me? I know there’s not a lot of food in the cupboards, I’m going grocery shopping with Kai in a couple hours.”

 

He was meeting Kai, so it wasn’t a Kai free weekend.

 

“Want to come along? We’ll actually invite you this time,” Lu Han said flicking more cereal at me.

 

It missed and I shook my head no. At least I could have a Kailess weekend or as much free of him as I could. Lu Han shrugged and took one more bite of cereal before getting up.

 

“Have it your way then.”

 

He turned and stretched and I froze with my spoon against my lips. Some of the cereal fell off and back into the bowl, making little plopping sounds. There was something on my brother’s neck, little red spots and then something huge and purple. I hadn’t seen it before and I really didn’t understand why. What were they…h-hickeys?

 

“Hyung, what’s on your neck?” I asked.

 

Lu Han whirled around, his hand immediately going to his neck to cover the marks. He looked at me wide eyed, mouth opening and closing as if trying to figure out what to say. I put my spoon back into the bowl and stood, going over to him. I grabbed his hand and yanked it away from his neck and used my other hand to push his head to the side. Red marks littered one side of his pale white neck with a huge purple bruise and what looked like pin prick scratches…teeth marks?

 

“When did this happen?”

 

Lu Han pulled away from me and rubbed his neck. “When I went to your school Thursday.”

 

“And why haven’t I seen it yet?”

 

“Because I’ve been covering it up. I forgot to do it before I came down here.”

 

“You’ve been covering this? Who _bit_ you hyung?”

 

Lu Han looked reluctant to tell me, but he sighed in defeat when his eyes met mine. “Kai.”

 

Kai bit my brother. I threw my hands in the air in frustration. “Why would he bite you? Do I need to go beat him up or something? Is he abusive?”

 

Lu Han shook his head. “It wasn’t abuse.”

 

**“Then** why did he bite you?”

 

My brother shrugged. “I don’t know, felt like it I guess.”

 

“People don’t just bite other people because they feel like it, hyung.”  
  


Lu Han crossed his arms and glared at me. “Sure they do, you just wouldn’t know about that kind of thing.”

 

That kind of thing? Biting? “Fetishes? Don’t let Kai bite you just because he has a biting fetish.”

 

Lu Han frowned and turned away. “I didn’t mind it. I liked it, now I’m going to take a bath and get ready before you ask any more questions that’ll make you feel uncomfortable around your friend.”

 

I stared after Lu Han. He enjoyed Kai biting him. It seemed wrong. It wasn’t like I hadn’t heard of people having a thing for biting, but that bite looked like it hurt, it had to have hurt. I needed to talk with Kai about what he was doing to my brother; we needed to set ground rules, like no marking him and especially no biting. If I found where I wrote Kai’s address, I could get a taxi to take me there tomorrow or later tonight. I walked up the stairs and went to my room to dig through my school bag until I found the piece of pink stationary the student council girl had written Kai’s address down on. I stared at it then frowned. This couldn’t be right; the address was on the west side of our district. Kai’s Western style house was on the East side.

 

**형**

 

It wasn’t until the end of the next week I attempted to follow Kai again. I kept pestering the student council girl, asking her if she had really given me the right address. She said yes and seemed to become frustrated with me, which I was okay with because it was troublesome having girls liking me. One day I actually went to the said address. It was a small but expensive apartment that wouldn’t be able to fit seven young adult males. Maybe they had moved and left the apartment as the address for convenience’s sake. But, it just didn’t feel right.

 

Once again, I waited a ways from the bus stop Kai and I parted at. He met up with Tao again and they started down the street towards the shops. Kai didn’t detour off to a shop this time, though they did stop and buy snacks, at least not until his phone rang. They both stopped in the middle of the street and Tao peered over Kai’s shoulder to see his phone. I couldn’t hear what they said to each other because there was a group of loud girls close to me, but they waved and Kai turned down an alley. I immediately followed him, but when I got there, it was a dead end and Kai was gone. I frowned and hurried back onto the street. Tao was already far away, headed toward the subway. I groaned in frustration. I remembered the station that was close to where Kai lived, but I didn’t know which train to take there. There was a bus stop near the subway and I checked the schedule to see if any would stop there, but there wasn’t.

 

A Taxi. I spent that day’s bubble tea money on a taxi, sitting in the back with my arms crossed. The driver didn’t seem to understand why I wanted to go to the subway there and I didn’t feel like explaining it to him. What was I supposed to say? My friend was secretly in the Mafia so he had two houses. My friend was a runaway under government protection so he didn’t live where the school said he lived. My friend was some kind of monster who lived in the dark forest with a bunch of other guys. I didn’t know, there could be a perfectly reasonable explanation, but Kai never told me about it. He didn’t tell me about much.

 

He was a liar. He kept secrets from me, from everyone it seemed. I realized he never asked me about going to his house that one time, had Chanyeol not told him I was there? I never did trust Kai, maybe there was a good reason for that.

 

The taxi finally stopped and I got out. The area around the subway exit was much like a dead end itself. There was just the subway exit and then a long road that stretched back toward the city then trees, more building beyond those trees. I needed to walk in those trees, but I wasn’t really sure what direction to walk in. It was still light and I figured if I just kept walking straight, I’d eventually get somewhere where I could find my way home. So, I just started walking. I looked around trying to see any familiar trees or other landmarks, though there really were only trees. I looked on the ground for a worn path. There was an impression on the ground, though not very eroded and sometimes it veered in different directions, but I fallowed it the best I could and felt proud of myself when I finally came upon Kai’s old white house. I thought about just knocking and inviting myself in, but I didn’t come just to visit, I came to spy.  

 

I ran across the front lawn and plastered myself against the side of the house and started walking along the wall to peek into the backyard. Suho was standing around a well again. It looked cleaner then it had last time, like he had been fixing it. Kyungsoo stood next to him with a tray of drink and patted Suho’s back.

 

“You’ve done well, hyung,” Kyungsoo said and offered the older boy a drink.

 

Suho took it. His face was dripping with sweat and I could see a huge wet mark on his back. “Thanks, I’m almost done and we’ll have a nice clean well soon so we won’t have to fill the tub up everyday for me.”

 

“I don’t really mind, I share with you sometimes anyways,” Kyungsoo said and I made a face assuming they were talking about bathing together.

 

Suho wrapped his free arm around Kyungsoo’s waist and pecked his cheek. “It’s nice when you do, but this will be easier since we don’t live near the ocean like we did in France.”

 

“Do you need help with anything?”

 

“You ask that every time. I can manage.”

 

“You sure, I don’t mind. There are a lot of rocks and you’re already sweating.”

 

Suho sighed and rolled his shoulders. “Alright, actually I can’t get that really bit boulder out of the way and I kind of need more rocks to finish the top.”

 

Kyungsoo rolled up the sleeves of his school dress shirt and rubbed his hands together. “I’m on it.” He walked over to the large rock and lifted a leg, bringing it down hard. The rock cracked and fell apart………..it must have been a really soft rock. Heavy, but soft.

 

I moved back along the wall and jumped onto the porch, crouching in front of the window. I never knew Kyungsoo was so strong. I would have to remember to keep complimenting his food even if he had a bad day and made something disgusting. There was talking inside and I pulled back the curtain to see Kris sitting on the couch and Tao on the other end. I could hear Tao whining something to his older brother.

 

“Kris~~~ Wu Fan gege, why are you acting cold?”

 

“What does me not wanting to make you food have to do with acting cold, Zitao? Go make your own ramyun,” Kris said flipping a page in the book he was reading.

 

“Because I don’t want to boil the water,” Tao complained.

 

“You should be the last person complaining about time, Tao. You made me go through an extra whole day just so you could spend more time having sex with that friend of Jongin’s boyfriend.”

 

“I like Yixing gege.”

 

“Then go have him boil water for you.”

 

“Is gege jealous?”

 

“No…don’t you dare Tao.”

 

I watched as Tao moved into a crouching position on the couch. My eyes widened when I thought I saw something thin, long, black, and scaly slip out of his pants and swish in the air before he pounced onto Kris. They rolled onto the ground in some sort of play fight that looked a lot more serious than I assumed, with long nails and sharp teeth and another tail joined in the mix, a bronze color. Then they growled and I fell backwards onto the porch. There was clashing around and then I heard the sound of power going out.

 

“Baekhyun, Tao knocked the power out again,” Kyungsoo yelled from somewhere in the house.

 

I heard footsteps hurrying down the stairs and toward the front porch. I raced to the other side of the house and hid behind the trashcan there. Baekhyun came out of the house and around the side. He stopped at a little gray box connected to what looked like a generator. He checked the wires then sighed and stretched.

 

“He better be lucky I just cornered Chanyeol,” Baekhyun muttered and suddenly his body lit up like a human light bulb. He rubbed his hands together then place one on the generator and the other on the silver box. They both lit up as well and then the power in the house came back on.

 

“Ta Dah~~” Baekhyun sang and started for the front porch.

 

It took me a couple seconds to process what I just saw and I bolted toward the forest. I was pretty sure Baekhyun saw me (I heard him yell), but I didn’t care, I needed to get out of there. It was dark already when I got into the trees. I looked up as saw clouds making the late evening sky look like night. It was still the rainy season. I tried to run faster. If felt like someone was following me. I could see a sort of shadow from my peripheral and then it dropped in front of me.

 

“Sehun, stop.”

 

Chanyeol stood in front of me, ruffled up like he was last time. He sighed and messed with his curly hair even more. “Let’s talk, Sehun.”

 

**형**

 

Lu Han heard the door ring and poked his head out of his bedroom. “Come in, it’s unlocked.” He heard the door open and close and footsteps make their way upstairs. He turned and smiled seeing Kai standing in the door way staring at his phone confused.

 

“You asked me to come over?”

 

Lu Han nodded and went over to his pile of costumes, shifting through them. “Yeah, the professor gave me a good grade, but told me to try something a bit different since my model was too perfect for such a simple shoot. He wants me to spice it up.”

 

“Perfect, spice it up?” Kai asked amusement in his voice.

 

Lu Han tried not to think of the sexual implications the phrases his professor had used had on their situation since the said ‘perfect’ model was also Lu Han’s younger boyfriend. Of course Lu Han thought Kai was perfect, he was dating him after all. He wasn’t so sure about the spicing it up thing though he had spent the last couple of weeks sitting in front of the bouquet of white roses Kai had brought, that he moved into his room after catching Sehun picking at the petals multiple times, as he touched himself late at night when Sehun was already asleep.

 

“Yeah, that’s what he said,” Lu Han said and stood up with a suit and a top hat. “Let’s try something more magical then.”

 

“Magical, alright,” Kai said and took the offered clothes.

 

Lu Han busied himself with changing the backdrop of his set to a dark misty night blue to avoid seeing Kai naked. The scene he turned around to might have been even worse than seeing Kai shirtless again, though. He looked good in the black slacks and jacket and white shirt. Lu Han grabbed a cape and top hat and cane from the side and placed the hat on top of Kai’s head, handing him the cane and tied the cape in place then took back. Yes, he definitely looked good like this.

 

“I feel silly,” Kai said as Lu Han pushed him toward the back drop.

 

“You look great, like a vampire prince or something.”

 

Kai laughed the sound dark and nervous. Lu Han didn’t take notice, he was afraid he would be lost in the richness of any sound that escaped his boyfriend. He took his place at the camera and gave Kai a few instructions before beginning to snap pictures. Somewhere in the back of his mind Lu Han vaguely had the thought to wonder where his brother was. Sehun was sixteen and he did tend to go shopping on his own at times, so Lu Han was never too worried until it started getting close to midnight. Kai had mentioned to him about Sehun spending time with a girl from the student council, but Lu Han knew it couldn’t be anything romantic. Maybe he had found a girl friend that forced him to shop together.

 

Lu Han started snapping pictures of Kai. His eyes were so dark. Most of the shots had Kai looking straight into the camera or at least straight at Lu Han. The suit just added to Kai’s already dark but sweet allure and Lu Han tried not to shake as those eyes bore into him over and over. Sometimes Kai would smirk at the camera and Lu Han wondered if he knew the affect just his face had on Lu Han, it was almost embarrassing. Could you like someone’s face this much? Of course, it wasn’t just his face that Lu Han liked, or even his body. Kai was cute, cute and sexy and it made everything inside of him tremble as if he was filled with millions of butterflies trapped in cocoons ready to free themselves. After a few close up shots, Lu Han cleared his throat and declared he had enough.

 

“Hyung, I can’t undo the cloak,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han put his camera down on his desk and went over to help Kai undo the strings that held the cloak closed. It came undone easily and he peeked up at Kai suspiciously. Kai just looked back at him innocently, but Lu Han could see a small quiver at the end of his lips. He moved his hands and started to unbutton Kai’s shirt as if it was nothing, his slim fingers lightly grazing Kai’s golden collarbone. Kai suddenly leaned forward and pecked Lu Han’s lips.

 

Lu Han looked up at Kai a bit surprised. “What was that for?”

 

“For helping me,” Kai said and grinned.

 

Lu Han just shook his head and continued to unbutton the white dress shirt smiling. He felt another peck on his lips and whined softly. “Kai~”

 

Kai only kissed him again and again, each one getting longer and longer until Lu Han abandoned unbuttoning the shirt to wrap his arms around Kai’s neck instead. The pressure of Kai’s body against his caused him to step back and back until he hit the edge of his bed and fell unceremoniously onto the bed. Plushies and pillows plopped up and off the bed from the impact and Lu Han squeaked a bit in surprise, but otherwise just continued to kiss Kai back as his plump lips pressed hard against Lu Han’s, tongues sliding together. Kai seemed at perfect ease with taking the lead this time, a fast learner, Lu Han supposed as Kai moved on top of him on the bed and Lu Han melted, hands falling from Kai’s shoulders onto the bed to lay there at Kai’s complete mercy when his lips moved to his neck.

 

Lu Han moaned when he felt Kai’s teeth prick into his neck again. The hickeys from the week before were gone and the purple had slowly faded, but there had still been the small red scratches that didn’t seem to want to scab over and peel off. He couldn’t complain though, he remembered why he didn’t want to now that Kai had bit him again. The initial pain followed by the sucking and licking Kai did after biting him made him shiver and moan softly. His hips moved up and against Kai’s and he let out a louder moan of his boyfriend’s name then gasped, flushing pink. He hoped he wouldn’t come in his pants just from Kai’s attention on his neck, but it felt like he was close to doing just that if Kai didn’t stop.

 

A low growl escaped Kai and Lu Han gasped at the sound, deep and husky so close to his ear.

 

“You’re hard, hyung,” Kai whispered. He pushed his hips down on Lu Han’s an Lu Han moved his hand to Kai’s arms to brace himself at the wave of pleasure that followed the movement.

 

“Hyung, when you did that with my shirt,” Kai began and pressed his hips back down on Lu Han’s, “what did you imagine?”

 

“Your lips,” Lu Han said before he really understood the question.

 

“My lips? Where were my lips hyung?”

 

Lu Han pit his lip and looked at Kai. His eyes just bore into Lu Han. He felt like a deer cornered and pressed down by a lion. Would Kai do it? Would he put his lips where Lu Han needed them? Wasn’t it too fast for that? It had been a month maybe not even since they started dating. Did it really matter? Lu Han felt like he would be eaten by Kai anyways. He was an all too willing prey after all.

 

“Everywhere.”

 

Kai smirked, he smirked and leaned away. Lu Han watched as he slid the dress shirt from his shoulders and onto the floor before moving his fingers to the edge of Lu Han’s t-shirt and pushed the material up over his stomach and chest and Lu Han gritted his teeth together to keep from making any embarrassing noises that would make Kai stop.

 

“You’re so pale, I just want to mark you up, hyung,” Kai said and leaned down, kissing along Lu Han’s collar then down.

 

Lu Han wanted to say ‘Yes, yes paint me with your lips, Kai’, or something not so ridiculous, but his voice was cut off when Kai took one of his nipples in his mouth and he moved a hand to tangle in Kai’s dark hair. He sucked and nipped it, but didn’t bite and Lu Han groaned in disapproval. He wanted Kai to bite him again; it felt good when he bit him.

 

Kai moved away from his nipple and trailed kisses down his small light abs and teased the line of his pants top with nips and licks.

 

“Please Kai,” Lu Han begged. “I really…I can’t.” It was embarrassing to admit, but he couldn’t hold on longer. Kai either needed to stop so Lu Han could go to the bathroom or hurry up, he was about to let himself come in his pants.

 

Kai chuckled and nodded, flicking Lu Han’s pants opened with his tongue and pulling the zipper down with his teeth and Lu Han stared at him wide eyed, hips moving eagerly. His boyfriend reached into his pants and Lu Han grabbed at the sheets of his bed when Kai’s warm hand wrapped around his hard member as he pulled it free of his boxers.

 

“You’re so pretty,” Kai said, his eyes fixed on Lu Han’s member.

 

Lu Han nudged his leg with his foot. “Stop it…mnh…Kai.”

 

“And kind of bossy when you’re needy. I like it though.”

 

He was so embarrassing. His mouth was so hot, though, warm and soft as Kai moved to settle between Lu Han’s legs and descended his mouth around Lu Han’s member. Lu Han bit the side of his cheek to keep from coming before Kai had a chance to really show him if he could do anything with how inexperienced he said he was. It seemed he was much better at this than he was the first time they kissed. Or maybe he had learned trough the few times that had stolen kisses. The internet maybe? Whatever it was, Lu Han wanted to thank it for making his day dream dim compared the actually having Kai giving him his first blowjob.

 

Kai sucked and hummed and licked and occasionally grazed his teeth against Lu Han’s pulsing hot skin. Such a tease and Lu Han wished he would do something, push something against his skin. His stomach convulsed in small ripples at the intense pleasure. His teeth, his fingers, he was almost even willing to hand over his virginity to get something of Kai’s inside of him, but he was left with that want unsatisfied as Kai’s tongue gave what was most likely experimental but perfect flick against his tip and Lu Han arched, coming without warning into Kai’s mouth.

 

He heard Kai cough a bit, but no other protest of discomfort and he just laid there on the bed, fingers falling away from Kai’s hair as the younger boy moved away. Kai placed kisses up Lu Han’s body and Lu Han hummed, pressing his lips against Kai’s when they reached there. They kissed softly for a few moments before Kai sat back.

 

“I have to go now, hyung. You’re all clean, but you look tired. I don’t want to leave with you still thinking I’m hear and Sehun won’t like finding us asleep together like this,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han frowned, but nodded. He stuffed himself back inside and pulled his shirt down then watched Kai get redressed. They walked downstairs together and Kai pecked Lu Han’s lips before leaving with a smile. Lu Han sighed and shook his head. He was getting into this way too deep way to fast. He started back upstairs, but stopped catching his reflection on the bathroom mirror from the bathroom’s opened door. He moved closer and touched his neck painted red with hickeys and blood.

 

Blood.

 

Kai had been a bit too messy this time if he didn’t want to be found out. 


	10. And Kai Is A Monster

**Chapter 10 – And Kai Is A Monster**

 

 

I ran. I could hear Chanyeol chasing after me and he quickly caught me. He was surprisingly weaker than I thought and I got loose easily, but I didn’t run again. Chanyeol was fast and I had a feeling he could catch me more times than I would be able to free myself before our stamina ran out. I took a big breath and turned to Chanyeol. His eyes were large and urgent and he reached a hand out to me.

 

“Let’s go talk, Sehun.”

 

I let Chanyeol take my wrist and lead me through the dark woods until we got to the sidewalk on the other side of the subway exit. He sat on the curb and pulled me down with him. I tried to tug my wrist free. Chanyeol looked at me judging whether he could trust me not to run away again and let go of my wrist, folding his hands into his lap.

 

“How much did you see?” Chanyeol asked.

 

“Enough.”

 

“How much did you see?” he repeated.

 

I frowned and leaned back, looking up at the dark gray clouds almost black now that the sky behind it had basically turned to night. “I saw Kyungsoo break a boulder with his foot, Kris and Tao with tails, and Baekhyun become a human light bulb. I might be going crazy, but the fact you’re here right now must mean I stumbled onto something I shouldn’t have.”

 

“You’re right, you shouldn’t have, so why did you?” Chanyeol asked. “This is your second time coming here; I don’t know how Tao didn’t feel you following him.”

 

“I didn’t follow him, I tried but I just took a taxi here instead.”

 

“Was coming here today unannounced so important?”

 

“Yes. I felt like Kai has been hiding stuff from me. He’s dating my brother; I think I deserve to know about his home life.”

 

“He doesn’t know everything about you, yet, right?”

 

I tapped my shoes together and frowned. Chanyeol was right, but then, I wasn’t the one dating their friend’s brother. “He was hiding something though. I got his address a while ago, but when I went to it, it wasn’t here. Why is your address an apartment when you guys live here?”

 

Chanyeol sighed. “You shouldn’t have found out, but you will have to eventually. I guess it can’t be helped. Do you know what we are?”

 

I shook my head. “Some kind of monster?”

 

“Basically, yeah. We’re all some kind of monster.”

 

“What kind?” I asked.

 

“Well, Tao and Kris are dragons. Baekhyun’s a light incubus.”

 

“Incubus? Like a sex demon?” That didn’t sound…nice. What if Kai was a sex demon…no…he better not be I’d take a steak through his heart. No, those were vampires. How did you kill an incubus?

 

“Not exactly. He produces energy, but in order to do that he has to consume it. He consumes the energy given off during sex.”

 

“So that’s what you meant by it looked like it was what it was but not as it seemed?”

 

Chanyeol nodded. “He usually looks for a lover in each city we move to, but it doesn’t always happen right away and we need his power the most, like having electricity.”

 

“What about the others?” I asked.

 

“Suho’s something like a mermaid, maybe a siren would be a better explanation for it.”

 

Mermaid, water, Kyungsoo and Suho had been talking about water.

 

“We aren’t quite sure what Kyungsoo is yet, he hasn’t finished his change.”

 

“Change?”

 

“Not everyone is born a monster, Sehun; some of us are changed into them.”

 

“I don’t understand, like werewolves or vampires?”

 

“Werewolves and vampires are a type of monster, but any monster can change someone and they don’t necessarily become the same monster.”

 

“Who changed you?” I asked.

 

“No one, I was born a monster,” Chanyeol said and chuckled, a low rumble. “Baekhyun, Suho, and I were born monsters, we had at least one parent that was a monster whether born or created doesn’t really matter. Kris was created, he was the first one. Later on, when Tao was old enough, he went to turn him as well. They lived in a time where there was a lot of suffering in China.”

 

“Lived? You mean you guys are like really old?”

 

“We’re the age we say we are; we’ve just been that age for a long time, our aging is different. Suho was born, too, and then he created Kyungsoo.”

 

“They’re together, right?”

 

“Yeah, that was why Suho changed Kyungsoo. It wasn’t too long ago though; Kyungsoo was the last to join. It was Kris and Tao then Baekhyun and I then Suho and we found Kyungsoo the last time we were in Korea. I think it was sometime just after or at the end of the Korean War.”

 

The Korean War; that meant Kyungsoo could have been my great grandfather. I took a glance at Chanyeol. What would he have been? When was he born? I thought of Kai and Lu Han. Kai called Lu Han hyung, they all did, but was Kai actually the hyung?

 

“How old is Kai?”

 

“Kim Jongin is 16, 17 in winter,” Chanyeol answered.

 

“How long has he been that age?” I corrected my question.

 

“For sixteen and a half years.”

 

“But you said…”

 

Chanyeol turned to me, eyes serious. “Kai’s special. He’s the youngest.”

 

Special. There it was again.

 

“So he’s the same age as me? Was he created or born?”

 

“Both.”

 

“What do you mean? What kind of creature is he?” I asked.

 

Chanyeol suddenly stood up. “You shouldn’t ask me about Kai. He should be the one to tell you about himself. It was Kai’s parents that changed Kris though. You could say we’re kind of like a pack, a side pack from a much bigger one. Kris and Suho lead now, but Kai will lead eventually.”

 

A pack? Chanyeol was saying they really were monsters. Certainly I had seen some weird stuff back at their house, but Lu Han often said I would go insane by not socializing. Maybe I had. I didn’t feel as scared as I first had when I ran. I was in the presence of a monster; my brother was probably with a monster, too right now if my guess of where Kai disappeared to was right. Kai’s family being mobsters would have made more sense for hiding out in the woods and not in the apartment they were using as their address.

 

“You know, I don’t really believe any of this,” I said.

 

Chanyeol turned and looked down at me, hand on his hips. “Really, even after you saw Baekhyun all lit up?”

 

“It could have just been a play of lights, or I’m going crazy.”

 

“Going crazy would be more likely than lights playing tricks on you, Sehun. Would you like for me to prove it?”

 

“Sure I guess,” I said. I didn’t really know how he would unless he was going to take me back to their house which I wasn’t allowing encase they really were monsters and would eat me. That seemed like something monsters would do.

 

Chanyeol reached his arms out and stretched, letting a groan escape him. He winked at me before turning and walking into the road. My eyes widened when he left foot prints of fire behind on the gravel. He turned back to me, his face completely serious and raised a hand. Suddenly fire sprouted out of his back like wings. They unfurled reaching two car lengths inside and a mark appeared along Chanyeol’s face. His dark eyes, pitch black, looked back at me before his whole body was consumed in flames.

 

“Do you believe me now?”

 

The voice that came out of the fire creature before me was deep and rich, Chanyeol’s voice. Like this, it matched him well. What other voice suited fire?

 

 

**형**

 

 

When I got home on the last subway train for the night, Lu Han was already asleep. I walked into the house and up the stairs to peek in his room. He lay snuggled under his sheets peacefully asleep and I sighed. Had Kai been there? Perhaps he had run off to do another errand and it hadn’t been my brother that called him. But, when I turned and caught a glance at his computer still on, but asleep, I didn’t even need to touch it to know what I would see – he had a photo shoot with Kai. My friend had been here and gone without seeing me. Was he even my friend anymore?

 

A monster had been here and gone.

 

The next morning there was no school, but still, I woke up early and went to nap on the couch so I could hear when Lu Han came down. I fell in and out of sleep watching early morning cartoons until I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They went into the bathroom and I sat up, blinking sleep out of my eyes, almost wanting to tell myself to just forget about it and go back to my bed to sleep off the rest of the afternoon. Lu Han’s surprised yell woke me up though.

 

“Sehun, you scared me. What are you doing down here?” Lu Han asked coming to sit down beside me. He lifted his hand and patted my hair, combing the locks away from my forehead.

 

I reached up and grabbed his wrist, bringing his hand down into my lap and I played with his fingers.

 

“Sehun, is everything alright? Did something happen yesterday, you got home kind of late,” Lu Han said. I could feel his eyes looking at me nervously.

 

“Something happened. Hyung, I have to tell you something.”

 

“What is it? Did someone hurt you?” Lu Han asked.

 

In someway I felt hurt, but I didn’t think he meant emotionally. I shook my head. “No, I’m fine, but I’m worried about you, hyung.”

 

“Why? I’m perfectly fine, I’m happy.”

 

Happy. He was happy. The thought almost made me not want to say it, but I knew Lu Han would find out eventually, that or Kai would have to leave him one of these days. I didn’t want to see my brother heart broken because of that. I rather the break up be as quick and painless for my brother as possible. I didn’t really care what it did to Kai at the moment.

 

“Kai, he’s a monster,” I said.

 

Lu Han pulled his hand away. “What kind of nonsense are you spouting now, Sehun?”

 

That hadn’t come out right. I shook my head and turned to Lu Han. “It’s not nonsense. I went to Kai’s house yesterday. I went there before, and when I went to check his address, it was different.”

 

“They probably moved,” Lu Han tried to reason.

 

“Why would they move to an old western style house in the middle of probably the only woods in this part of Seoul?”

 

Lu Han looked down at his lap. “Well, there are seven of them and their parents. What kind of apartment would house that many boys?”

 

He was making up excuses. “No, I saw them, hyung. Chanyeol even told me. I went there and they were breaking boulder and they had tails and Baekhyun is some kind of human light bulb. And Chanyeol, Chanyeol showed me himself, what he was, this like, gigantic fire bird thing.” I moved my hands out, flapping them a bit to emphasize my words, but Lu Han’s wide eyes and raised brow only told me the more I talked the more he didn’t believe me.

 

“Really, and what is Kai then?”

 

I sighed and dropped my arms. “I don’t know, Chanyeol wouldn’t tell me.”

 

“So if I asked Chanyeol right now, he would tell me they were all monsters?”

 

I thought about then shook my head. “He would probably tell you to talk to Kai.”

 

Lu Han let out an exaggerated sigh and pushed my forehead with his head. “Really Sehun, I didn’t think you would go this far just so Kai and I wouldn’t date. You know, it was one thing to try and get between us before we were dating, but what’s getting between us now that we are going to do for you? You’re going to loose someone if you keep this up. Mostly likely Kai and I don’t want you to loose your only friend, Sehun.”

 

“I don’t want to loose my brother!”

 

 I didn’t mean to yell. Lu Han looked caught off guard. He turned away from me and looked down at his lap, biting his lip. I thought I might have made him cry and leaned toward him more to see if I had, but then I saw the fate marks on his neck. I reached out my finger and touched his neck, a large amount of foundation coming off. Lu Han jerked at my touch and looked at me scared. I jumped on him.

 

“Sehun, get off me,” he said trying to fight against me.

 

“No, stay still, let me see your neck,” I said finally pinning his wrist against his stomach and wiped at his neck more. More hickeys and a second set of bite marks appeared on his neck. I sighed and moved away.

 

“Hyung, you need to stop seeing Kai, I know you think I’m crazy, but it’s true. He’s been lying to us, and he’s not what we thought he was.”

 

“I know.”

 

“What?”

 

Lu Han sat back up on the bed and touched his neck, holding his hand there. “I know, Sehun. I know that Kai isn’t human, at least I kind of figured that out myself.”

 

He knew? “Then why are you protecting him?”

 

“Because I don’t care, Sehun,” Lu Han said and stood up, looking at me. “I don’t care if Kai’s a monster, I wouldn’t care if he was a mobster or a poor runaway. I wouldn’t care if he was an alien even. I didn’t want to tell you this, Sehun, because it’s way too soon and it surprised me, too. Kim Jongin drives me crazy and ever thought that isn’t filled with you or school is filled with him. So, I don’t care if he’s some werewolf or vampire or whatever…a monster, because…because I love him, Sehun.”

 

“What…no, Lu Han hyung,” I said. Loved him?

 

Lu Han held out a hand. “No, Sehun, stop. You can talk with Kai and I will talk with Kai, but the decision lies with us in the end. If you go to someone, you’ll just seem crazy and then Kai and all his brothers will probably disappear if they aren’t chased down and nothing will be the same between us. At least like this, you can learn to share me gradually, Sehun.”

 

“I don’t want to share you,” I said. What was Lu Han talking about? He should be scared, calling and crying on the phone to Kai to leave and never come back, or maybe not so dramatic. He loved him?

 

“Stop being a brat, Sehun.” Lu Han moved around the couch and toward the door, slipping on a jacket over his jogging pants and t-shirt. “I’m going to get lunch and bubble tea, what kind do you want.”

 

“I don’t want any.”

 

I could hear Lu Han breath a sigh of frustration. “Just go back to sleep, Sehun, you woke up too early.”

 

And then he left.

 

 

**형**

 

Dance practice got out early on Monday and I stopped Kai on his way out of the dressing room. He looked surprised which, considering the fact I hadn’t answered any of his calls or texts that weekend and had been avoiding him like the plague all day, sleeping right through lunch even, seemed like a reasonable reaction. Before I could say anything though, my stomach growled and Kai chuckled.

 

“Let’s go get something to eat, Sehun.”

 

I nodded and followed Kai out of school and onto the street. We stopped at a bubble tea place that served cakes and snack as well. He ordered for me and brought over a few different snacks and my usual bubble tea as well as one for himself. I grabbed one of the snacks and stuffed it in my mouth, sighing when it slid down my throat and into my stomach.

 

“I’m surprised you made it through dance practice without eating anything. I know you were avoiding me, but you could have sat at lunch with us, it’s not like you had to sit with me.”

 

I frowned and sipped my drink. “I didn’t want to see your face.”

 

“Fair enough, I guess you might not want to after finding out about that.”

 

I looked at him surprised. Did Kai know that I knew what he was? “You know why I’m avoiding you?”

 

Kai coughed and looked away, blushing a bit. “Because of that night I was at your apartment and you weren’t there. I guess Lu Han let it slip.”

 

I looked at him curiously. “What are you talking about, Kai…did you do something to my brother when I wasn’t there. I swear, he better still be a virgin or I will drive a steak through your heart, Kim Jongin.”

 

“Steak through my heart? If it’s not that, then what?”

 

“No, first tell me what you did to my brother.”  
  


“Nothing, nothing, I promise he’s still a virgin,” he said then made a crossing motion over his heart, “at least mostly.”

 

“Kim Jongin~,” I growled.

 

He patted my head and I wanted to bite his hand.

 

“Calm down there, dongsaeng. Now explain to me about the steak through my heart thing.”

 

“You’re like a vampire or something, right? You bite my brother all the time,” I said.

 

Kai laughed, but it sounded a bit off and I smirked. Was I making him nervous? Good.

 

“Maybe I just like biting, Sehun. You’re not really going to make me explain about the things I do to your brother when we’re having our boyfriend time, are you?”

 

I made a face. “Don’t, and don’t call it boyfriend time, it’s weird.”

 

Kai laughed seeming more confident now. Confident that I didn’t know his little secret? It would be fun to watch that confidence break.

 

“That wasn’t what I meant. I’m talking about the fact you’re a monster.”

 

Kai’s face went completely blank and he sat there stiff. I twirled my straw in my bubble tea and took a sip.

 

“It’s not nice to call your friend a monster just because of his kinks.”

 

“I’m not calling you that because you’re a pervert, Kai, it’s because you are one. I have been to your house twice. The first time, everything seemed normal, they knew I was there, your brothers, that time you went to my apartment and confessed to my brother. The second time was the other day. They didn’t know and I saw everything.”

 

“You were just seeing things,” Kai defended.

 

“Chanyeol told me. He showed me, too. You guys are monsters, but he wouldn’t tell me anything that had to do with you, Kai. So, tell me, stop lying to me and tell me everything.” I tore open a bag and took a bite of the bread inside.

 

“Shit,” Kai said and tapped his fist hard against the table. “You weren’t supposed to find out about it.”

 

“You were going to keep it a secret, even from Lu Han?”

 

Kai shook his head. “No, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. We were just supposed to settle here for a while, until I finished high school, maybe college if I didn’t want to do that somewhere else and then we were going to go into hiding for a while. We were supposed to live normally for a while, but I guess that’s too much to ask for a prince.”

 

“Prince? Kai, what are you?”

 

Kai ran a hand through his dark hair and looked at me. “I’m a monster, Sehun; it’s as simple as that. The type of monster I am, though, isn’t so simple. A long time ago, there use to be kingdoms of monsters spread out everywhere, but they’ve been hunted down since then and gone into hiding, but there are still royalty, anyone directly descended from the old kingdoms. My parents were descended from that, they’ve lived a very long time, but they’re still fairly young. They were only on their second live through when they created Kris. Did Chanyeol tell you about that?”

 

I nodded. “He told me the order that they joined and who was created and born. He said you were both.”

 

Kai nodded. “My parents, they knew they would need to find someone to bear their child, but, you see, they are both men, it wasn’t until seventeen years ago that they finally found someone to bear me, a human girl. In order for me to be both of their children, my father, or mother, who had more of the royal blood, fathered me while the other, well, he changed me. Being born and changed doubles my, power; I guess you could say, so I’m like supposed to be really important to the monster society. I’m not the first one to be like this, but it’s important for us that are like this to find someone.”

 

“What do you mean, find someone?”

 

Kai licked his lips and took a drink of his bubble tea. “That’s the part I didn’t mean to happen. When you are of royal descendent like me, you have to find a partner quickly. My parents found each other in their first fifteen years of life, just before they actually fully developed. I’ve been really pressured into finding one myself, before I turn nineteen. That was one of the reasons my brothers and I made that one month rule, but I didn’t care for it. I really didn’t care at all until I met you…and then Lu Han.”

 

I sipped on my drink for a while before I realized it was empty. “So, you’re like going to make my brother Dracula’s bride?”

 

“I’m not a vampire; Sehun…thought you’re not that far away. I haven’t finishing developing yet, so I’m not sure what type I am.”

 

“You bite my brother, obviously you’re a vampire.”

 

Kai chuckled. It was a bit scary sounding this time and I looked at him curiously.

 

“Maybe you’re right, I do tend to suck out blood when I bite, but we all bite the one we want to change.” He held up three fingers.

 

“You bite them three times?” I asked and counted on my fingers. “You bit Lu Han twice already.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“You’re going to change my brother?”

 

Kai nodded. “I love him. It’s not mating or soul mates or anything like that, but we have a keener sense of who is good for us. Lu Han is good for me.”

 

“You’re not good for him, though.”

 

Kai stood and ruffled my hair, but a moved away from his hand. He closed his eyes and sighed. “Sehun, that’s for him to decide.”

 

 


	11. In Which Chanyeol Gives An Offer

**Chapter 11 – In Which Chanyeol Gives An Offer**

 

“So I heard you started sitting with Kai again,” Lu Han said as he plopped down on the couch, stealing the cookie I was about to eat out of my hand and stuffing it into his mouth.

 

I stared at my hand not sure what to do about the lack of cookie I was suddenly presented with. I frowned and whipped my hands together to get rid of the crumbs. “Well, I would starve if I didn’t. And I don’t sit with him, I sit with Chanyeol and Kyungsoo, Kai just happens to sit there, too.”

 

“Whatever you say, Sehun. If you really hated Kai because of what he is, you wouldn’t sit with his brothers either.”

 

Lu Han did make a valid point; then again, it was Kai dating my brother, not his brothers. I had tried to avoid Kai again after our talk in the bubble tea place. I was successful for one day before the hunger really got to me. I started lagging during dance. Lu Han had been eating out with Yixing, so there wasn’t any cooked food lately. He told me to eat with Kai or order something. I didn’t want to eat with Kai, and ordering when Lu Han wasn’t there…I didn’t like eating alone.

 

I turned and looked at Lu Han about to demand that he get me another cookie when I took in his appearance. He was wearing a green army jacket over a black fitted tee and tight dark jeans with straps sewn on the sides. His hear was all shinny and flat, not the usual fluffy frizziness. He got up and started for the kitchen as I sat there thinking. I could hear him rummaging through the cupboards and I pressed my lips realizing what he was doing.

 

“Hyung, stop eating and come here.”

 

Lu Han walked out of the kitchen with a bag of chips nestled under one arm. I reached across the couch and grabbed them from him, eating them myself.

 

“You’re doing that thing where you eat anything you find. You do that when you’re nervous. You’re dressed up, so what’s up?”

 

Lu Han fiddled with his fingers before looking at me. “I’m going on a date with Kai.”

 

The chip in my hand cracked and fell on my lap; I picked the crumbs up and put them on my tongue. “You talked to him about him being a monster yet?”

 

“Yes, we talked after you two did,” Lu Han said and went over to the bathroom. I could see him messing with his hair.

 

“Then why are you going on a date with him? You two should be broken up now.”

 

Lu Han came out, fixing his jacket. “And I told you that I didn’t care, I love him.”

 

“He bit you twice already,” I reminded.

 

“I know that…that’s why I’m nervous.”

 

“Why?”

 

Lu Han pulled the jacket of and inspected it. “I shouldn’t have to tell you why, isn’t it obvious?”

 

It seemed like it was, but I just couldn’t let myself think about that. “It’s just a date.”

 

“It’s an important date, Sehun.” He nodded at the jacket and slid it back on. “Should I wear a hat?”

 

“It’s night time, hyung, you don’t need a hat. Why is it important?”

 

“Sehun!” Lu Han exclaimed. “Please stop acting ignorant. I made a choice, Sehun. You’ll be fine, I have always known you would be fine, but I want something that who I am won’t get in the way of. ”

 

“You’re fine, but I won’t be.”

 

Lu Han shook his head. “I’ll always be your brother, Sehun, that won’t change. Now do I look okay?”

 

We needed to have a serious talk. Lu Han knew we did, but he wasn’t about to let that happen. If we talked I might be able to change his mind, but he didn’t want that. Lu Han was stubborn and so was I. If we didn’t talk about it until after it happened then we would have to just deal with the consequences not the ‘what ifs’. And I couldn’t stop Lu Han from leaving. He was still my hyung after all.

 

“You look fine hyung. What does being bitten have to do with looking nice?”

 

Lu Han bit his lip and looked at me carefully. “It doesn’t, it has to do with other things.”

 

Other things…I wanted to throw up. “Hyung, you can’t.”

 

My brother just lifted his nose into the air and fixed the collar of his jacket. “I’m twenty years old, Sehun. Yixing and Xiumin lost theirs a long time ago. If I feel like doing it, I’ll do it.”

 

I covered my hears with my hands and hid my face in my knees. “Hyung, I don’t want to hear it. Oh my gosh, hyung, why?”

 

“Don’t act all innocent yourself, Sehun,” Lu Han said coming over and pushing my head back into the couch. He smiled at me and brushed my bangs up. “Some day you’ll do it, too.” He leaned forward and pecked my forehead. 

 

I gave him a disgusted look when he moved away. “I think I’m asexual hyung.”

 

Lu Han took the chip bag and threw it at me. “No you’re not. I know you have jgvs under your bed.”

 

My eyes widened and I threw a chip at Lu Han. “Hyung, why were you in my room.”

 

“I’m the one that cleans it, silly.” He threw the chip back at me then grinned. “Oh, and I barrowed a couple, Kai and I watched them the other night.”

 

“You didn’t really?”

 

Lu Han laughed. “No, we didn’t need to.” He winked and I blushed looking away.

 

“Why are you like this right now?”

 

“Because I’m nervous. Now where in the world is Kai? I’ll knee him in the crotch if he doesn’t get here on time.”

 

I raised a brow and grinned. “I’m kind of hoping he doesn’t get here on time, then he’ll be in too much pain.”

 

“You’re so cruel to your friend,” Lu Han said glaring at me.

 

I just shrugged and started eating the chips again. “You’re the one saying he’s going to knee his boyfriend in the crotch.”

 

Lu Han sighed. “Right.”

 

The doorbell rang and I frowned. I wanted Kai to be late. Lu Han immediately became all smiles as he walked to the door and opened it. Kai stood there nervously in a sweater and fitted jeans, a jacket over one of his arms and a bouquet of white roses in his other hand. I scoffed when he looked down bashfully as he handed the roses over to Lu Han.

 

“Here hyung, the others are going to die soon, right?”

 

Lu Han’s face become gentle and all serene like as he took the flowers and tucked them into his arm then took Kai’s hand and pulled him inside. “Just stand there for a minute, Kai. I’ll go replace them really quick.”

 

Kai turned and our eyes caught. I glared at him and mouthed, “I hate you.”

 

He raised a brow at me then lifted his hand and did that weird grabby wave and grinned. “You love me,” he mouthed back.

 

Lu Han returned and took Kai’s hand. He waved at me saying something about dishes or cleaning, I wasn’t paying attention; I was glaring at Kai’s back as they left. I turned in the couch and crossed my arms glaring at the blank television. Was my brother really expecting me to just wait here until he came back if he even did that tonight? I grinned suddenly, coming up with an idea. I got off the couch and went upstairs to my back pack, looking for my wallet. I threw it across the room when I found it empty.

 

What to do now?

 

I went back to the living room for my phone, charging on the coffee table, and looked through my contacts. Chanyeol had stolen my phone at lunch the other day and passed it around. I searched through it to see if maybe he had put his number, or if one of the other hyungs had put their's. Strange names appeared, something about a panda and beef, and then I saw it: Phoenix.

 

“A fire person with wings could be a phoenix,” I said then decided to dial the number.

 

I could tell it was Chanyeol just by the breath that came before his deep surprised, “Hello?”

 

“Hyung, tell me which train gets to your house, I’m coming over.”

 

Surely, they would go to Kai’s house for that and I was going to be there to stop it.

 

**형**

 

Chanyeol was waiting on the other side of the street for me when I finally got to the exit in front of the woods after walking off the subway train on the wrong stop twice. He waved at me, grinning brightly, his smile almost like a street light itself. I wondered why he wasn’t the human light bulb incubus instead. I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my jacket and hurried across the road.

 

“Hey Sehun, why the sudden visit?” Chanyeol asked wrapped an arm around my shoulder.

 

“Can’t I just come and visit?” I asked, moving a bit closer to Chanyeol. It was starting to feel cold now that it was the beginning of November and he felt warm. Did it have to do with him being a fire monster?

 

“You could if you didn’t have a thing against monsters,” Chanyeol said and his arm tightened around my shoulders.

 

“I don’t have a thing against monsters,” I said then looked at him. “Aren’t you cold, you’re just in a t-shirt?”

 

Chanyeol blinked at me, leaning away a bit. He shook his head and grinned. “No, I don’t get cold easily. It’s sort of annoying because I’m always hot. Baekhyun and I share a room and he likes I warm. It’s kind of nice when he has lovers because then he’ll spend his nights there and I can have a cold room. Oh, but that’s not what we were talking about.”

 

I moved away from Chanyeol’s hold and looked into the woods. It was later than the last two times I had been here; already dark and I couldn’t see very far into the woods.

 

“You just felt warm, that’s why I asked.”

 

“Okay, but you still haven’t properly answered my question, Sehun, what are you doing here?”

 

“Kai and Lu Han are on a date.”

 

“I know that. He kept bugging Kyungsoo and Baekhyun about his clothes and what he should wear and a bunch of stuff. He wanted to wear those shoes I bought him, but Baekhyun wouldn’t let him.” Chanyeol’s voice was filled with amusement at the memory. The thought of a nervous Kai was funny, but I couldn’t laugh at this. I just didn’t really feel like laughing.

 

“It’s a special date, what do you think they’ll do?” I asked.

 

“Hmm, probably eat, maybe a movie, I’m not sure, Kai was sort of keeping it a secret from us,” Chanyeol answered.

 

I took my hand out of my pocket, flicked some lint onto the ground then stuffed it back inside. “What will they do after the date?”

 

Chanyeol didn’t answer right away. I could hear him breath, the slight smack of his lips as he parted them and closed them again without a word. “Sehun, did you not talk to your brother about this?”

 

“He won’t let me talk about it. He wants it to happen.” My fists clenched inside my pockets.

 

“Sehun, sit down for a minute,” Chanyeol said.

 

I turned and saw him fold his long stature down on the sidewalk. I groaned and went to sit down beside him keeping my hands in my pockets.

 

“How are you feeling right now, Sehun?” Chanyeol asked.

 

I looked up and down the dead end road. There never seemed to be any people here, I wondered why there was even an exit here. Sure others had gotten off with me, but they had all walked away from the woods, not toward it.

 

“I feel alone, scared.”

 

“Why? Is it because your brother isn’t here, that he might not be with you much longer?”

 

I shook my head. “No, it’s because I’m sitting on the sidewalk at night with a monster. I don’t know you that well yet; you could still try and eat me.”

 

Chanyeol busted out laughing. The deep rumble and repeated clapping startled me and I jumped staring at Chanyeol as if he had grown a second head. Which, he very well could have, I didn’t know what all powers monsters had.

 

“You’re really something Sehun,” Chanyeol said finally halting his laughter. “You let a little out then find the funniest ways of covering it up.”

 

“I wasn’t covering anything up.”

 

“Sure, sure,” Chanyeol said then his hand was on top of my head, ruffling my hair softly. “You’re a good kid, Sehun, I like you.”

 

“Don’t call me kid, unless you want me to call you an old man,” I said.

 

“I’m not old, I’m only nineteen, and I just have been nineteen for over a hundred years.”

 

“Over a hundred!”

 

Chanyeol shrugged and removed his hand, his fingers slid down my face and shoulders as if he wasn’t really paying attention to the motion. “Kris, Tao, and Suho have been alive longer. I think Suho lived longest, but he’s considered younger than Kris.”

 

“When do you stop aging, how do you know?”

 

“When you get your full monster form, that’s when they stop counting your birthdays. I got mine just before my twentieth birthday.”

 

“That must suck, only a bit shy of another year,” I said.

 

“It does, sometimes I don’t know whether to say if I’m nineteen or twenty. Luckily I don’t have to worry about that here in Korea. Right now I’m pretending to be a year younger, though.”

 

“But Kai doesn’t have his full form?” I asked.

 

Chanyeol nodded. “We think we know what it’ll look like, but it’s not completed yet, probably when he’s eighteen. It’ll speed up if he has…”

 

“A bride.”

 

“That’s a funny way of putting it, but yeah, a bride.”

 

“Lu Han…if he isn’t fully developed yet, can Kai even change someone?”

 

“Yeah, you can change someone as soon as you’ve gone through puberty. Once you’ve started having wet dreams, you can start looking for someone to change,” Chanyeol said.

 

I frowned.

 

“Are you going to answer me now, or just keep asking questions?” Chanyeol asked. “The stuff you’re asking, it’s just going to put you in a worse mood.”

 

I stretched my legs out and tapped the heels of my shoes on the road. “Kai and my brother are on a date right now.”  
  


“Yes, we went over this already.”

 

I folded my legs back up, leaning forward on them so I made a sort of ball, hands still in my pockets. “Afterwards, they’re going to have sex.” It was a bit uncomfortable like this, my wrists hurt. “And I’m here to stop that.”

 

“Stop them from having sex?”

 

I nodded.

 

“Sehun, if they’re going to have sex, I doubt they would come here to do it,” Chanyeol said.

 

“Well, they definitely wouldn’t go to our apartment; they think I’m still there.”

 

Chanyeol pushed my shoulder and I teetered before resting back in place. “There’s this thing called a love motel, ever heard of it?”

 

“Kai’s only sixteen; he can’t get one, can he?”

 

“Your brother can, and that’s all that matters.”

 

“They’re both guys.”

 

“Then they’ll go to the gay district or Lu Han will get the key himself; there’s different ways they can get around it, Sehun.”

 

I leaned my head between my knees. “Shit.”

 

Chanyeol hummed. “Seems like you came all the way over here for nothing.”

 

“I should have just followed them, now my brother’s going to loose his virginity to my best friend in some dirty hotel room.” I kicked out one of my legs, my head falling solely onto the other.

 

“Is that all you’re worried about, Sehun, your brother having sex?”

 

No. I nodded, though.

 

“You’re bad at lying, or at least in this situation.”

 

“Shut up,” I muttered.

 

“Fine, if it’s really only about the sex, it’s not so bad.”  
  


I looked up at Chanyeol. Again, it was like he sprouted a second head. Of course my brother loosing his virginity would be a big deal.

 

“I mean, it’s not like they are just going to have sex. They’re going to make love. Your brother would have sex eventually anyways.”

 

I shook my head. “No he wouldn’t.”

 

Chanyeol sighed and I could feel him just staring at me. I curled up more into myself.

 

“Okay Sehun, I’ll prove it to you.”

 

I looked up at Chanyeol. “Prove what?”

 

He held his hand out. “That sex isn’t what you’re worried about.”

 

I steadily removed one of my hands from my pocket. “And how are you going to do that?”

 

Chanyeol smiled, not the one that made one side of his face scrunch up, but the soft one, the pretty one. “Let’s have sex, Sehun.”

 

I hesitated then took his hand.

 

형

 

Chanyeol’s hand felt big holding mine. I stared at it as we walked through the woods, big, but somehow attractive. It wasn’t until the dim light turned brighter that I looked up. We were in front of Kai’s house. Chanyeol didn’t stop pulling me, just went straight to the door and led me inside. I thought I should look at his face, read his expression, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to know it. I looked at the furniture instead. It was all old, as if they were just using whatever furniture was left in the house, or maybe it was the furniture they had kept over the years they had been together, mismatched and scratched.

 

Chanyeol led me upstairs and that’s when I started to resist. “Wait, what about the others?”

 

He turned and looked at me; his expression was soft, sweet. I looked down at the carpeted steps. “They aren’t here. Kai asked Tao to go to Lu Han’s friend’s place to keep him busy in the case you tried to pull that stunt again like you did on their first date.”

 

“He has another friend,” I said.

 

“I’m sure there was a reason you called that one in particular though.”

 

Yeah, Xiumin was mischievous, but not a gossiper or nosy.

 

“Kris is spending the night at the apartment to work peacefully, you know where Kai is, and Baekhyun’s with that Jongdae guy. The only other people here are Suho and D.O and their bedroom is on the first floor. They’re probably already asleep.”

 

So we didn’t have to worry about people hearing us. What exactly would they hear anyways?

 

Chanyeol tugged on my hand and we walked the rest of the way upstairs. There were two sides to the second story surrounding the stairs, each with two doors; I guessed the other three bedrooms and a bathroom. We went to the right and to the room on the end where I had been standing the first time I visited Kai’s house. Chanyeol opened the door and pulled me inside.

 

The bedrooms looked more modern than the rest of the house, walls painted a blue tinted white with posters hanging here and there. There were two twin sized beds, one in front of the window and the other against the wall with dark colored sheets on them and two desks, like a dormitory, with a large closet on the other side. Chanyeol pulled me in front of the window bed. I looked down at the messily made sheets and then at Chanyeol.

 

“What am I supposed to do?” I asked.

 

“Get undressed then lay down on the bed.”

 

“Do I have to be completely naked?”

 

Chanyeol shook his head. “You don’t have to, but I am.” He started to lift up his shirt and I stared at the light outline of his stomach, pretty abs sketched into it. He slipped his pants off and I just stared. Definitely a guy.

 

“So, are you getting undressed or are you just going to stare at me the whole night?” Chanyeol asked.

 

I looked up at his face. His cheeks were a little pink, but otherwise he didn’t look a bit rattled about standing naked in front of the younger boy he just asked to have sex with. Well, he was probably use to it, he wasn’t a virgin after all, and I would feel pretty confident if I looked like him, too.

 

I cleared my throat and pulled my shirt off. It wasn’t like I hadn’t been naked in front of another guy. I lived with my brother and when we first started living on our own, we tried to save water by showering together, but the shower was too small so we gave up on that, and then of course there was the changing room for dance class and gym. I looked down at my feet and slipped my shoes off and socks then paused with my hands on my pelt.

 

“You don’t have to do that, Sehun.”

 

“You’re naked, I can be too,” I said and undid my belt letting my jeans and fall and pushed down my boxers.

 

“Oh, wow,” Chanyeol said.

 

I looked away feeling embarrassed. “It’s not like you’re unattractive or anything, of course it’ll be like that.”

 

Chanyeol laughed. “I wasn’t talking about the fact you’re hard, you’re just bigger than I thought.”

 

 I turned my head back to Chanyeol and let my eyes trail down to his member that was starting to stand, too. I looked at mine and grinned a bit.

 

“Lay down on the bed,” Chanyeol instructed.

 

I gave him an unsure look before moving the sheet away and laying down still, head on the pillow. His curtains were opened and I looked out his window. You could see the moon above the trees from here.

 

“Is it going to hurt?” I asked.

 

“Not at all,” Chanyeol answered and I heard the bed creak.

 

I thought he was lying, I had heard it did hurt your first time, and if you were a guy, maybe every time if you weren’t use to it. I looked down and saw Chanyeol straddle my legs. He ran a hand through his hair. It was straight again, I hadn’t realized. A lock feel forward into his face and I wanted to reach out and move it back, but he was too far away.

 

“Look, Sehun,” Chanyeol said and moved the lock back in place, “you can tell me to stop at any time, but all you have to do is lay there.”

 

I didn’t really want to stop, we hadn’t even started. “Okay.”

 

I gasped when I felt Chanyeol’s hand around my member. He started moving it up and down, his thumb playing with the head and I brought my hand up to my mouth to keep from groaning. He moved his hand faster and leaned forward. I felt his lips on my collarbone, kissing it, then he did a weird thing with his tongue and I shivered. His other hand ran slowly down one of my side, going in with the curve of my body and then resting on my hip.

 

“You’re not exactly slim, but you have a nice shape,” he said and kissed down my sternum. He moved his hand from my hip and pinched one of my nipples and I bit my hand. His other hand was still stroking me and it had slowed down its pace. “This is your first time being touched by someone like this, right?”

 

I nodded.

 

Chanyeol moved his hand from teasing my nipple to my wrist, pulling it away so my hand was freed from my mouth. His thumb rubbed against the indentions of my teeth in the skin.

 

“You don’t have to keep quiet, Sehun. Suho and D.O won’t do anything. Just make whatever sound you want,” he said and then moved down my body, his lips against my stomach, outlining the lines of my developing muscles there. “Soft,” he said, “but it’ll become hard soon.”

 

I wasn’t sure if he was talking about my abs or something more embarrassing. I didn’t really care when I felt something hot and wet suck at the tip of my member. I looked down and saw Chanyeol working his mouth down and around my member. He seemed to be having trouble. I had never given head before, but I figured it was something you could only do well if you either didn’t have a gag reflex or were experienced in it. His teeth grazed my skin and I hissed.

 

“Hyung…have you done this before?”

 

Chanyeol lifted his head away and wiped his mouth. He didn’t look at me, but he shook his head. “Nope.”

 

His mouth went back to my member, but this time he just took half of it in, which was more than enough for me. How was I supposed to explain this, just hot, wet, and oh so good. I had masturbated before; of course I had, but this…I had never really thought what any of it would feel like. It felt good. I groaned, moaned, I tried not to scream or make any kind of high pitched noise. I wasn’t a girl and I wasn’t Lu Han either, I had some pride even if I ended up in his position. There was another squishing noise, it sounded good, too, even though I didn’t know what it was, I kind of didn’t want to know.

 

“H-hyung…” I said trying to get Chanyeol’s attention. I could feel heat about to erupt in my stomach. Really, a blow job was too much; I could have probably lasted longer if it had just been his hand. I could have definitely. “Hyung…I-I.”

 

I didn’t get to finish. My fist was back in my mouth as I arched off the bed and up into Chanyeol’s mouth. Chanyeol moved away, coughing a bit and my eyes widened seeing my cum leaking from the side of his mouth.

 

“Hyung, I…I tried to tell you,” I said.

 

Chanyeol shook his head. “It’s fine, I couldn’t really hear you.”

 

He shifted up on me, started stroking my member again until it stood up. My eyes widened when he positioned himself over me and I grabbed onto his arm. “Hyung?”

 

Chanyeol smiled at me. “I said it wasn’t going to hurt. Just lay there.”

 

I stared at him for a couple seconds before nodding and lying back. He lowered himself and I had to grab the pillow above my head at the tight heat that suddenly surrounded my whole length.

 

“Shit hyung!”

 

“Sh-shit…”Chanyeol mumbled.

 

I tried to stay perfectly still and looked at Chanyeol. He was quivering and his hands held tightly to the sheets at my hips. Pleasure coursed through my body and I tried to speak through it without moaning. “Hyung…you haven’t done this before either…h-have you?”

 

Chanyeol shook his head again and then started moving. My hand went to grab his hips, not ready for the sudden friction. My whole body rippled with it and I could feel my fingernails digging into his thighs. I couldn’t form words, I decided not to even try, just moaning pathetically like some kind of dog, at least that’s what I thought I looked like, maybe Chanyeol thought I looked good opened mouth moans and virginal groans. Maybe he didn’t care.

 

He sounded good, though. Small whimpers from the pain with deep soft moans of pleasure when my hips began to act on their own and move up into him. Chanyeol arched back after a while, mouth partially opened and he grew louder before elapsing into quiet barely audible moans then back again, louder. I stared at his long neck as he lolled his head with the pleasure. He moved his hands to my stomach, his fingernails scraping there and I could feel scratches being made, most stomach probably getting marked up, looking like I got attacked a bird’s talons. I would just tell them that I did, a large bird, a hawk.

 

“S-sehun,” Chanyeol moaned and leaned forward. His breath ghosted against my lips and I stared up at him through half lidded eyes. His eyes were closed.

 

“Chanyeol…hyung,” I said back. His lips were close, I didn’t dare move though. “Eh…ah!”

 

Chanyeol gasped when I came inside of him. He kept going as I tried to catch myself, my mind filled with white and pleasure. I opened my eyes just in time to see Chanyeol come as well, quietly, but with grace – an arch of his back, lips parted in a silent moan, the he slumped forward. He stayed there on me for a while before rolling off onto the side of the bed, an arm laid across my chest. One of his long legs across mine.

 

“I should…go back home,” I said. If Lu Han and Kai were just going to go to a hotel there was no point in me being here. I froze when I felt Chanyeol’s hair against my neck.

 

“Stay, Sehun. I’ll wake you up early in the morning so you can sneak out. You don’t want to sleep in your house alone.”

 

I didn’t really mind sleeping alone, Lu Han sometimes slept at his friend’s house during projects, but I stayed anyways.

 


	12. And Then My Brother Looses It To My Best Friend

**Chapter 12 – And Then My Brother Looses It To My Best Friend**

 

 

Lu Han tried not to pay attention to the warm hand clasped with his after he closed the apartment door. He could feel Kai’s blood circulating through his hand and it felt warm against his. He hoped his own hand wouldn’t start sweating, it never had before, but things seemed to fail you when you least wanted them to. In the presence of other people he could pretend to be the adult, the one in charge, and the one leading his relationship with Kai. In the presence of Sehun, Lu Han lost the image of the older seducer with his younger lover, but he still was allowed to pretend that he was an adult and in charge, that his big brother status allowed him that. When he was just with Kai, he was a teenage girl. His cheeks flushed pink and his whole body felt as if butterflies continuously landed and took off from his skin. He and Kai met up a few times since that photo shoot, not experiencing as much as then, but there was touching and he could feel himself loosing the control of the relationship with every new place Kai’s mouth found. He didn’t really mind. A guy had never courted him before, but he understood why girls liked it, why he had wanted it. Kai was the seducer; Lu Han had just showed him how to start.

 

He fiddled with his keys in his jacket pocket and Kai led him down the hall into the elevator by their clasped hands. He didn’t want to catch Kai’s attention, make him smile big and bright at him, he didn’t want to be a puddle of feelings like goo spreading across the carpet of the hall. It would be embarrassing to have any of his neighbors see that as well as bad if he was trying to keep his ‘good’ reputation in the building (which meant keeping his dating of a boy, especially younger, low key). He breathed a sigh of relief when they finally got into the elevator and started down the six floors.

 

“You think Sehun’s just going to sit there all night?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han rolled his eyes. He attempted to do a hand gesture to accompany the rant he was going to say about how exactly he felt about his younger brother at the moment, but his one hand jerked against Kai’s and he decided against it, holding Kai’s hand tighter. “He can do what he wants; it’s not going to change anything. He’s just being a stubborn kid.”

 

“Yeah, but isn’t he entitled to be a kid still?” Kai chuckled a bit and nudged Lu Han’s arm with his.

 

“He is, but not right now.” He nudged back. “Hey, you got here later than I thought you would. You’re usually at our door five minutes after you say you’re on your way. What took you so long?”

 

“I brought the car.”

 

“You brought a car, but you can’t drive yet.”

 

Kai looked away and pressed his fingers of his other hand on his lips, nibbling on them. “Kris brought me. He said he would drive us to town because he was headed that way anyways, but we have to walk back. Usually I just teleport.”

 

“You can teleport?” Lu Han asked. They hadn’t had the deepest discussion on what it meant to be a monster, just the specific, a briefing and then a lot of kissing and Kai whispering into his ear how much he liked him.

 

“Oh, I never really told you about that I guess. I just teleport everywhere.”

 

“Just must be convenient. Wish I had that power.”

 

The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Kai moved his hand to Lu Han’s wrist and dragged him out of the elevator, Lu Han pouting all the way through the lobby of his apartment. He missed the warmth of Kai’s hand clasped with his, but he knew why he had done it. Holding hands was fine, but not for long periods of time, he knew that.

 

Outside, a sleek white car waited for them. Kai opened the back door for Lu Han and Lu Han slid all the way to the other side so Kai could slide in beside him. He was nervous to meet Kai’s eldest brother. The man he knew only as ‘Kris’ had lived since the 1900’s, over a hundred years.

 

“Hello,” the man in the front seat greeted a handsome tall guy in a suit, golden brown hair slicked back.

 

Lu Han greeted him back then settled into his seat. Kai took his hand once his brother started to drive, holding it lightly in his, resting on his lap. Lu Han smiled a bit and leaned his head against Kai’s shoulder, trying not to think about the other man around his age in the front.

 

“Do you like cats?” Kai asked after they started driving through the city area.

 

“They’re alright,” Lu Han said. “I don’t mind them.”

 

Kai nodded. “Hyung, you can stop here.”

 

Kris parked the car and handed Kai a few won before waving them off. Kai took Lu Han’s wrist when they were out of the car and started leading the way down the road.

 

“Where are we going?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Cat café, that’s okay, right?”

 

Lu Han nodded.

 

It was a small corner store with a big leaping cat cut out as the sign. Kai opened the door for Lu Han and he walked inside. It was a dimly lit area and the cats didn’t move from their spots, just turned their heads to him, a few looking away after only a second finding no interest in him. A lady came up to them, complimenting them and welcoming them, went over the rules of the cats with them. They took a seat in a booth off in the corner and Kai got up to order them coffees and some kind of sweet, Lu Han didn’t specify. Lu Han was surprised when he came back followed by a small pack of cats. He sat and the cats jumped up onto the booth, surrounding him, the smallest coming over to Lu Han to rest in his lap when there was no more space with Kai.

 

“You’re good with cats.”

 

Kai chuckled nervously and stirred his coffee, pushing down the mountain of whip cream into the frothy brown mixture. “I would have taken you to a dog place instead, but dogs don’t really take well to monsters, cats seem to like us though.”

 

Dogs didn’t like them? Lu Han chuckled. “My nickname for Sehun when we first met was Puppy. He was like my little guard dog throughout high school.”

 

“Well that would make sense why he’s so against us now,” Kai said finding the amusement in it as well. “What was he protecting you from?”

 

Lu Han looked down at his frapuccino, pushing down his whip cream as well then lifted his straw and licked it clean. “Hmm, well, I lived in China until I was fourteen. I was with my grandmother, but she passed away, so I came here. I went to a multicultural school in China, so it wasn’t so bad there, but here, they kind of found it odd that I was half Chinese and half Korean. My Korean wasn’t perfect either, good, but not perfect. I couldn’t understand some of their jokes and then also my appearance, lots of the girls liked me. Sehun has always been curious when it came to me; suddenly having an older brother would be surprising.”

 

“Yeah, I would think. All of mine were already in our pack when I was born,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han nodded. “Yeah, so he often went looking for me if I took too long getting home from school since I got home later than he did. He found me getting beat up by some of the neighborhood kids often on my way home. They wouldn’t beat him up because he was just an elementary school kid and Sehun just isn’t someone you beat up. He had a bit of a speech problem back then so he had learned to be really good at glaring at people so he didn’t have to talk.”

 

Kai laughed. “Afraid of a ten year old?”

 

Lu Han laughed as well. “He was a scary ten year old. Hmm, you know, don’t cats like vampires?”

 

Kai raised a brow at Lu Han, petting one of the cats in his lap, another one nuzzling his head. “I’m not a vampire.”

 

“Sehun said you were. He thinks you are.”

 

“I’m probably a lot of things. One day I’ll show you what I have so far of my full form.”

 

**형**

 

They went to an arcade after. Lu Han frowned at the cat hair that covered his jacket. Kai had tried to wipe him off, but rather than have Kai’s hands all over him, Lu Han thought it better to just walk around impersonating a cat. They started with a car game. Only one of the stations were opened and Lu Han stood behind Kai as he took the first turn, cheering him on, grabbing his hair whenever Kai went off the road as if he was actually riding in the back seat of the car. Kai yelled at him a couple times and pouted when his final score came out.

 

“I could have won that, hyung,” Kai complained and moved out of the chair.

 

Lu Han only laughed and slipped into the seat next, starting his round. He had practiced driving before. He still didn’t have his license, but he knew the basics and got on well until he started to feel Kai’s fingers play along his neck. Where those his lips? Lu Han peeked around the arcade. There was a boy sitting beside them engrossed in his own game and Lu Han really hoped he had just been imagining it, but he felt them against his neck gain and jumped, the car running off the road. He tried to swat Kai away, the younger boy laughing until Lu Han’s time ran out and he didn’t even cross the finish line.

 

“You cheated Kai.”

 

Kai just held onto his elbow and pulled Lu Han over to an air hockey table. “Let’s play this now.”

 

“You sure? I’ll win,” Lu Han said taking up his mallet. 

 

Kai laughed and flipped a coin. “Heads or tails hyung?”

 

“Tails,” Lu Han said. The coin landed on heads and Kai placed the buck on the table.

 

“Let’s have a contest hyung. Whoever wins gets one wished granted by the looser.”

 

Lu Han nodded. He was confident when it came to games, particularly those of strategy. He always won against Sehun and had learned to loose on purpose so his little brother didn’t feel bad. “Prepare to embarrass yourself, Kim Jongin.”

 

The machine dinged and Lu Han didn’t get a chance to position himself before the puck came flying at him and slipped into his goal. He looked up to see Kai grinning at him.

 

“You were saying?”

 

Lu Han plucked the puck from his goal and crouched down, preparing to start the next round. “This is war.”

 

He hit the puck toward the left and watched as Kai’s hand moved to block it hitting it back to him. Lu Han tried to hit it again, but the puck easily landed in his goal again. He frowned and looked at Kai who was grinning. He pouted his lips and made his eyes really big, looking at Kai as he got reading to hit the puck again.

 

“Kai~,” Lu Han whined when he was sure Kai’s attention was on him. The younger boy’s eyes glazed over a bit and his plump lips parted. Lu Han smirked and hit the puck toward Kai’s goal. Kai snapped out of his daze and just barely missed blocking it before the puck slid into his goal and Lu Han gained a point. Lu Han threw his arms in the air and jumped around a bit.

 

“Cheater,” Kai muttered, but laughed as well.

 

Lu Han settled back into a ready position. He tried to get Kai’s attention on him again, but his boyfriend only concentrated on the air hockey table. He hit the puck and it slid smoothly into Lu Han’s goal.

 

“I win,” Kai announced.

 

“We still have one more round,” Lu Han protested.

 

“I already won three of them, hyung, give up.”

 

Lu Han sighed. “Alright, what do you want?”

 

“My wish is to see hyung dance,” Kai said and pointed at a dancing game.

 

“I’m not so great at those.”

 

“I doesn’t matter if you win; I just want to see you dance.”

 

Lu Han nodded and walked over to the machine. He slipped his jacket off and handed it to Kai before he mounted the machine. “I’m just going to dance, okay? I don’t really care about the arrows.”

 

“I don’t care about the arrows either, hyung,” Kai said and held up his fist. “Hwaiting!”

 

“Hwaiting!” Lu Han said back smiling. He flipped through the song selection until he found something he though decent enough. He put it on easy so he could at least try and follow along with the arrows, but they were so slow that Lu Han gave up on them after the first few seconds. He just let the music move his body, flowing with it. He didn’t think he was the best dancer, honestly he thought Sehun was better than him and Yixing had always been top of their class when they met in dance school in high school. Lu Han thought his himself good, though, and he wanted to impress his boyfriend.

 

Kai cheered him on even when there was the repeated annoying sound of him missing the arrows. He didn’t really care; he just wanted to dance for Kai. The music stopped before the song had finished and Lu Han pouted at the screen with a large red F. He grinned and started laughing.

 

“Kai, I lost,” Lu Han said and jumped down from the machine. Kai took his hand to help him though he didn’t really need it.

 

“It’s fine hyung, let’s play some more games.”

 

“Lu Han nodded. “What did you think, though?”

 

Kai leaned toward Lu Han, his lips breaths lengths away from Lu Han’s ear. “Beautiful.”

 

They placed a few more games, shooting zombies and throwing basketballs, earning tickets. They had a nice handful by the time they went to get a snack in the food corner.

 

“I’ll buy you a prize, hyung,” Kai said raising the ticket.

 

“Shouldn’t we both get one?” Lu Han suggested.

 

“We’ll get matching ones then.”

 

They walked up to the prize counter and Lu Han looked over the different plushies and little toys.

 

“Cats,” Kai said and pointed to a row of different colored cats about a foot tall.

 

“Dogs, too,” Lu Han said seeing the row under it. He spotted a white one and checked the tickets. “We can get one cat and one dog.”

 

“I thought you wanted matching ones, hyung.”

 

“I do. Excuse me, can I have that white dog,” he said to the clerk who took his half of the tickets and handed him the white fluffy dog, like a wolf. “Now you pick a cat, Kai.”

 

“Okay, I want the black one.” The clerk took his tickets and handed him the cat.

 

They both walked outside the arcade and Lu Han pulled him to the side. “Now we trade them.”

 

“Trade? Oh, here,” Kai said handing the black cat toward Lu Han.

 

Lu Han laughed and shook his head. “Not like that. Here, this is…Jonghan.” He handed Kai the white dog.

 

“You named it?” Kai said smiling and took the white dog. He handed Lu Han the cat. “Okay, then this is Lugin.”

 

“They’re our babies,” Lu Han said, trying to look serious but feeling silly.

 

Kai lifted a hand to Lu Han’s neck, rubbing it a bit a sign of affection. Lu Han wondered if he actually wanted to kiss him though.

 

**형**

 

They went back to Lu Han’s apartment first. Lu Han held up a finger to his mouth as he opened the door for Kai to be quiet. He walked in first, looking around for his brother, but did not find Sehun on the lower floor.

 

“Sehun’s not here?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han nodded and pulled Kai up the stairs, fingers entwined. “He must have gone to the bubble tea place close by. He likes to hangout there with the grandmother that runs it when I may not come home.”

 

“Oh. You know, hyung, we can go to the apartment. Kris will let us have it.”

 

It was a good idea, Lu Han admitted it, but he just felt they had to do this here. They would eventually and Sehun needed to understand. He hoped Sehun did and that was why he had left. “Sehun won’t be back until almost midnight if that’s where he went. It’s only ten thirty right now.”

 

Kai didn’t protest again and took the lead to Lu Han’s bedroom. He let go of Lu Han’s hand once they were inside and went to his bed to place the dog and cat plushie on the end of Lu Han’s bed. Lu Han pressed himself against the door, closing it and reached behind him, locking the door with a click that rung in his ears. Kai turned to him, smiled, and then reached his hand out. Lu Han moved to take it.

 

“Are you sure about this, hyung?” Kai asked. “We didn’t really talk about it in detail.”

 

“You’re going to make me one of you; I’ll be a monster, too.”

 

“It won’t take effect right away; you’ll have a couple months to still be human, hyung. And Sehun?”

 

“Sehun will be fine, I know he will,” Lu Han said and placed his hands on Kai’s shoulders. He looked up into the younger boy’s eyes and smiled. “I love you Kai. You’re a monster who stole my heart.”

 

Kai chuckled and leaned down, pecking Lu Han’s lips. “If that’s your logic, then you’re a monster, too. I love you, Lu Han.”

 

Hearing those words from Kai for the first time made Lu Han’s body tingle. He pressed his lips against Kai’s, deepening the kiss. He wanted to get lost in the feel of the younger’s plush lips pressed against his. He leaned up, fisting the shoulders of Kai’s sweater in his hands. He wanted him. He wanted Sehun’s happiness and Kai’s heart. Selfish wants they were, but they were the only things he asked. He had never asked to be accepted for who he was; in fact he wanted to embrace his difference. With Kai, he felt he could do that, maybe that was why it was so easy to fall in love with Kai, because this was where he wanted to be. 

 

Kai’s hands moved under Lu Han’s shirt, fingers rubbing against his stomach as their tongues started to play together. His hand moved up, exposing Lu Han’s stomach to the cold air of his room before moving away and pulling Lu Han’s hands from his shoulders. Lu Han sighed as Kai peeled his jacket off him then started to undo his pants. Lu Han pulled his shirt off himself and stood there in front of Kai naked. Kai ran his hand down Lu Han’s chest, pressing his fingers against the red spots that littered spots of his skin.

 

“You shoulder be naked, too, Kai,” Lu Han said.

 

Kai grinned and leaned in, placing kisses on Lu Han’s neck. He grabbed Lu Han’s hands and led them to the hem of his pants. Lu Han took the hint and began to undo the zipper and button, teasing the skin above with his pinky. He pushed Kai’s pants and boxers down, slipping down with them and away from Kai’s lips. He looked up at Kai nervously, searching for some guidance as this was one thing he knew Kai had more experience in than he.

 

“You don’t have to do that, hyung.”

 

“I want to return the favor.”

 

Kai nodded and Lu Han daintily reached his hand out to wrap around the base of Kai’s member. He stroked it a couple times before leaning in and licking the tip testily. It was weird and he tried not to think about what this actually was or where it was going to go, he just wanted to pleasure Kai and wrapped his lips around the head. Kai groaned and one of his hands tugged on Lu Han’s hair. Lu Han let out a surprised groan at the tug causing Kai to moan. He moved his head up and down only a few centimeters, testing how he should do this before taking in as much as he could and beginning to suck.

 

“L-Lu Han…stop,” Kai said not too long after Lu Han started to get the hang of the rhythm.

 

Lu Han looked up at his boyfriend curiously and removed his mouth, going to place kissing along the sensitive skin instead. “What is it?”

 

Kai shivered, eyes closed and lips parted. Lu Han found the expression intoxicating and kissed Kai’s member more.

 

“I’ll come, hyung,” Kai said, a hesitant moan escaping after the words.

 

“That’s okay,” Lu Han said.

 

Kai shook his head. “No, inside of…hyung.”

 

The words now out in the air made Lu Han blush. He nodded and stood up.

 

“Lay on the bed, hyung,” Kai instructed.

 

Lu Han moved to the bed, bending over to push his stuffed animals to the side and out of the way. He grinned to himself when he heard Kai groan and he could feel him staring at his bottom. He turned and made eye contact with Kai as he lay down on the bed. The longer they looked at each other, the more Lu Han became nervous again. He wanted to keep some control in this, but it seemed like he would be totally lost in it all. Kai’s eyes were just so black, burning into him. He was the prey and Kai a gentle hunter that would tastefully devour him.

 

Kai pulled his sweater off over his head along with the under shirt and walked to the bed. He climbed on top of Lu Han, the elder’s heart thumping stupidly at their closeness. He stared up at Kai; lips barely parted and tried to stay completely still. The seconds they stayed like that seemed long, but the moment Kai’s lips descended on his in a fiery frenzy of tongue, he knew they had barely been there.

 

Lu Han lifted his hands to tangle in Kai’s dark hair, moving his tongue with the younger’s until he broke for air, head turned to the side exposing his neck. Kai’s mouth moved to the abused flesh there, kissing it and adding more marks and Lu Han moved his hands down the his neck and along the planes of Kai’s shoulders and back, feeling the lean muscles under the pale gold skin. His nails scratched at it and he arched up. They both gasped as their members met, naked and free and calling for each other.

 

“K-Kai…Jongin.”

 

He rutted forward before removing himself from Lu Han’s neck, looking down at him with lust swirling in those black eyes Lu Han. “Your…eyes are black.”

 

“It’s a monster thing,” Kai whispered out, voice deep, needy. “Are you sure about this? There’s no turning back for either of these things.”

 

Lu Han nodded. “I won’t change my mind, so don’t ask again.” He reached up and pulled Kai down for another heated kiss, moving his hips up to touch Kai’s again.

 

His boyfriend responded enthusiastically, hips pressing back down hard, swiveling. “Do you have something?” Kai asked.

 

Something? Lu Han blushed knowing what he meant and reached under his pillow pulling out the small bottle he had purchased the day he decided he would be doing this with Kai. “Here.”

 

Kai took it and continued to kiss Lu Han as he shifted between the elder’s legs and uncapped the bottle. Lu Han busied himself with Kai’s lips as he heard the slight swish of the thick liquid on Kai’s fingers then he felt the cold liquid and Kai’s warm fingers at his entrance, rubbing it and encouraging it to open to him. Lu Han’s breath hitched and he had to pull away from the kiss to breath and calm himself. He moved his hips a bit causing one of Kai’s fingers to breach the first ring of muscles and Kai began to move his finger fully inside.

 

The initial stretching didn’t hurt, but it felt strange, a good kind of strange that made Lu Han anticipate more. The third finger and fourth hurt and he spread his legs wider hopping that would help. His whole body went rigid when he felt Kai press the tip of his member against his whole. This was it; he was actually going to have sex and to think he was loosing it to his younger brother’s best friend who wasn’t even human.

 

“I love you, Lu Han,” Kai said and then he was inside him before Lu Han could even respond.

 

At first, Lu Han didn’t register anything other than the fact Kai was inside of him, filling him, but then the pain was there and he groaned, head leaned back in the pillow and eyes closed. He felt lips on his neck and hummed at the comforting pleasure it brought. After a bit, he moved his arms to Kai’s shoulders. He wrapped one around them and pressed the hand of his other hand on the back of Kai’s neck, pressing his lips more against his neck.

 

“I love you, too, Kim Jongin. I want to be with you forever.”

 

He felt a smile against his neck and then the pain of teeth sinking into the soft flesh there. He arched as the pleasure from the bite began to course through his body, his member brushing against Kai’s abs and he could feel himself begin to all. Kai began to move and Lu Han hissed as the first few thrusts brought an uncomfortable pain, but the sucking on his neck, blood flowing into Kai’s mouth from the bite, helped to ease it and he felt the pleasure that came with sex and making love.

 

“Jongin!”

 

He saw flashes of light behind his lids as Kai’s thrusts switched to a different angle and his hands clawed at the back of his shoulders. “Kai!...A-Ah!”

 

Kai removed his teeth from Lu Han’s neck and moaned into his ear. “Hyung~…Lu Han…ah.” His thrusts became faster and harder and Lu Han closed his eyes surprised by the intensity of the pleasure coursing through his body. Did it feel this good because it was sex, because it was Kai, or because Kai was a monster? He hadn’t calculated being this lost in it, but he loved it.

 

Lu Han’s belly felt fool, twisting, trying to find more room for the pleasure to pool, but there wasn’t any. “Kai!” he screamed when his body released, coming between their stomachs hard. His body continued to tingle with the after waves of left over pleasure as Kai continued, deep grunts escalating into a loud moan of Lu Han’s own name followed by the feel of thick liquid squirted inside him. He arched and moaned softly at the feeling, moving his hips a bit with Kai’s as the younger finished.

 

Kai sighed and lay down on top of Lu Han, placing kisses along his shoulder. “You’re mine now, hyung.”

 

Lu Han stroked his boyfriend’s sweaty dark hair and nuzzled his cheek against the top of his head. “Yes, yes I am.”

 

Kai shifted a bit so he could hold Lu Han. “Should I leave soon, before Sehun comes back?”

 

“I locked the door, so stay; he can’t do anything now anyways.”

 

He smiled feeling Kai’s lips press against his and held tight to Kai. The other reached around for Lu Han’s sheet and brought it up to cover their naked and sweaty bodies as they laid there waiting for sleep and Lu Han smiled to himself feeling warm and completed. Kai never pulled out.


	13. In Which I Come Home Late

**Chapter 13 – In Which I come Home Late**

 

 

Chanyeol woke me up when the sun had just begun to rise over the horizon. I didn’t really comprehend anything until I had had all my clothes messily pulled on me and then we were walking quickly through the trees to the subway exit. He told me Kai was an early riser and that I should get back quickly in case he decided to come home early. I slept on the bus and almost missed my stop. It was a hard walk to the apartment. I felt tired, but relaxed. All I wanted to do was curl up in bed and sleep all day, which I usually did, but this was different. I didn’t want to sleep because I was tired but because I just felt so loose. Was this the after effects of sex? I kind of liked it.

 

It was dark inside the apartment. I didn’t bother looking at what I was doing and just kicked my shoes off and started for the stairs. I stopped though when I heard something from in the kitchen. It sounded like someone was looking through the cupboards. Was my brother home? Maybe he hadn’t stayed the night with Kai like I thought. I walked into the kitchen trying to be quiet. I could just make out the outline of someone by the sink and raised my hands, planting them on their shoulders.

 

“Hyung!”

 

The person jumped and turned around and the bit of light coming from the small window above the kitchen sink fell on their face – larger bridged nose and plump lips. Kai. I looked up and down my friends frame, the sleepiness and post sex haze lifting. He was shirtless, pantsless too only in boxers. His eyes were wide, almost frightened. He was scared of me?

 

“Why are you here Kai?” I asked taking a step back.

 

Kai placed the cup he had been holding down on the counter. He kept his voice down to a whisper. “I…I came for a drink of water.”

 

“In just your boxers?” I hissed back. Lu Han must have been asleep

 

“I thought you knew I was here,” Kai said and looked around the kitchen for something. “I thought you were asleep in your room still.”

 

His eyes landed on me and he tilted his head to the side. “Did you just get in, Sehun?”

 

He thought I was here. He was in his boxers, obviously he had stayed the night, and I hadn’t been here. I should not have gone to Kai’s house, but if I hadn’t, would that have changed what happened here? I wanted to go back to Chanyeol’s bed, sleep a few more hours and then when I came home maybe Kai wouldn’t be here.

 

“You stayed the night?” I asked trying to avoid his question.

 

“Yes. Lu Han talked to you about it, didn’t he?”

 

Lu Han mentioned it, but it really had happened. I moved forward and grabbed the back of Kai’s head, tugging on his hair. His eyes went wide before his face changed; eyes black and I saw him grit his teeth as if trying to keep himself from snarling as I pushed him against the sink. I leaned in close glaring at him, trying to burn those pools of oil that were his eyes with my own. I had gotten use to seeing them and they didn’t scare me anymore.

 

“You had sex with my brother?”

 

He didn’t answer and I shook him by the back of his hair. He groaned and I took a peak down at his hands clenching and unclenching the side of the sing edge. His nails looked long and sharp, maybe just a trick of the dim lighting.

 

“Yes,” he hissed out. “Sehun…let go of me.”

 

I shook him again and he growled.

 

“Did you change my brother?”

 

“I bit him,” he answered.

 

I tugged his hair hard then pushed his head down so I hovered over him. “You’re horrible…you…you…I hate you.”

 

“Sehun!”

 

The kitchen lights turned on and Lu Han stood in the doorway, arms crossed on his bare chest, sweat pants covering up his bottom half. I could see the red dots covering his chest and the large purple mark on his neck. My brother.

 

“Let _go_ of him, Sehun.”

 

I didn’t see why I should, but my body did anyways. Kai moved away from me, eyes still black and I hadn’t been wrong about his nails. Lu Han placed a hand on his shoulder and leaned in. Their lips touched and I looked away.

 

“Go home now, Kai, I’ll call you later.”

 

We both just stood in the kitchen listening to Kai run up the stairs and then back down fully dressed. Lu Han walked out to see him off and I waited until the door had closed before emerging into the living room.

 

Lu Han stood in front of the door. He lifted his arms and wrapped them around himself. “Turn on the heater, Sehun.”

 

I nodded and went over to the thermostat, turning it up. I fiddled with it for a while before sighing and turned back to my brother. Lu Han was sitting on the couch now a small blanket we usually kept there wrapped around his shoulders.

 

“Sehun, you were supposed to come home before twelve, those are the rules. I came home before twelve, but you never called. I would have called if I had decided to stay somewhere else; I was going to tell you in person that I was going to stay somewhere else.”

 

“You didn’t even notice I was gone, hyung,” I said.       

 

“I never imagined you would have stayed out this late, coming home early in the morning with your clothes all rumpled like that. Where were you? If you were going to stay at a friends, you should have texted me, but…what friend would you have stayed with?”

 

I didn’t like it when he brought up me not having friends. I didn’t need any of those. He didn’t use to say it this often, not until Kai.

 

“I didn’t stay at a friend’s.”

 

Lu Han looked up at me. “Did you stay with the grandmother from the bubble tea shop?”

 

I shook my head. Lu Han scrunched his eyebrows up, his eyes roaming over me.

 

“Where in the world did you stay?”

 

“With someone.”

 

“With someone…With someone!” Lu Han yelled.

 

I cringed and looked away. “Don’t be a hypocrite, hyung.”

 

“A hypocrite? Sehun, you knew who I was staying with, you knew we were going to do that, I told you. Kai and I have known each other for over two months, which still isn’t much, but it’s something, and you know Kai. Do I know who you were with?”

 

“I doesn’t matter, just leave it.”

 

“Leave it, leave it! Sehun, you came home early in the morning and I find you on the brink of physically fighting with Kai. Obviously something is wrong? Did they hurt you?”

 

 Nothing was wrong until I saw Kai in only his boxers in our kitchen. “No, I’m fine.”

 

“So they were gentle with you?”

 

I pulled my jacket off and folded it onto the coffee table. “I wasn’t in that position.”

 

“It wasn’t a girl?”

 

“Of course not.”

 

“You didn’t seduce a middle schooler did you?”

 

“It was an older guy and I didn’t need to do any seducing.”

 

“I didn’t think you had someone you liked,” Lu Han said and reached out a hand to me.

 

“I…I don’t,” I said and took his hand. He pulled me down onto the couch. I shifted around and then laid my head on his lap, facing his stomach. “It was just sex, hyung.”

 

“Your first time is never just sex, Sehun. I thought hard about doing it with Kai and it was definitely not just sex. You stupid, stupid little brother, I wish you would try to understand me. I’m not some princess you have to guard; I’m supposed to protect _you_. How am I supposed to do that if you’re like this?” Lu Han said. I felt his fingers begin to brush through my hair and he leaned down, his bangs mixing in with mine. “I’m so so sorry, dongsaeng.”

 

He was going to cry, I could feel it. I pressed my nose against Lu Han’s stomach and moved one hand to hold his side. I felt like when I was in my last grade of elementary and I had my first wet dream. It had starred one of the idols that decorated Lu Han’s wall only a few months after Lu Han had told me he was gay. He thought it was his fault.

 

He thought this was his fault.

 

I could have said no.

 

My body began to shake and I pressed my lips lightly against his wet stomach.

 

**형**

 

I huddled on the couch with one of Lu Han’s large stuffed animals wrapped in blankets, my head just barely poking out from the covers as I watched the television. Early that morning, I had tumbled out from my warm bedroom wrapped in blankets and came downstairs. Initially, I was going to turn the heater up, but ended up just flopping down on the couch and turning on the television. I sniffled and buried myself more in the blankets. There wasn’t anything interesting on and I wanted to sleep more.

 

“Sehun, are you awake already?” Lu Han called coming down the stairs. He disappeared into the bathroom with a pile of clothes. It was twenty minutes before he returned.

 

“Hyung,” I called. My voiced sounded weak and I cleared my throat to call again. “Hyung.”

 

Lu Han looked at me, his eyes widening. “Sehun, what are you doing like that? You look like a caterpillar, don’t play around.”

 

“I think I’m sick,” I said and sneezed.                            

 

My brother frowned and moved over to me pressing his hand on my forehead. “You’re a little warm. I’ll turn the heater up, but I know you don’t like the hot, so if it starts getting too uncomfortable, turn it down.”

 

“Why can’t you turn it down?” I asked shifting a bit on the couch.

 

“Because I have a date.”

 

“With Kai?”

 

“Yes. Call me if it gets worse, but I’m pretty sure it’s just a cold since it snowed yesterday. I’ll make you tea and put your medicine out here, you should be better tomorrow, just rest.”

 

I nodded. It had been two weeks since Kai had last come over. There was a sort of tenseness between us; we weren’t exactly avoiding each other, more of just not talking to each other. During class he still took notes for me and when lunch came around we sat at the same table, just not next to each other. We tried not to get teamed up together during dance practice, but afterwards, we somehow still ended up walking to the bus stop Kai met Tao at together. I had learned that Tao had a job teaching wushu to kids after the main class hours were over from Chanyeol.

 

Lu Han hadn’t mentioned much about Kai either. I would have thought they had broken up if it wasn’t for his weekly visits to the school in which he would talk to Kai’s brothers and greet me before the two of them went off together and the late night telephone calls. I figured the texts were from Kai, too, though he could have just been gossiping with Xiumin and Yixing. I could tell he was trying to get me to forgive him, paying over attention to me. He tried to start cooking again and even set up a brother date the previous night that led to a snowball fight and me curled up on the couch sick. It wasn’t his fault I had sex. I had only regretted it in that one moment curled up on Lu Han’s lap, but I was fine otherwise.

 

It wasn’t like the experience had been bad.

 

“Alright, I’m going to go now, I’ll be back before supper, okay,” Lu Han said. He leaned down and placed a kiss on my forehead. “I put the tea on the coffee table and there’s medicine there. Take the first two tablets now and two more in four hours if you’re away by then. There’s also orange juice in the fridge if you ever escape your blankets.” He tugged on my cocoon of warmth and I frowned at him.

 

“Okay, I understand, you can go now.”

 

Lu Han sighed then smiled. “I’m going now.” He started for the door.

 

“Have fun,” I said.

 

“Have fun? You’re not going to fight me?” Lu Han asked. I couldn’t see him, but I could imagine his surprised face.

 

I sneezed. “Does it look like I’m in the mood to fight you? Just go play with Kai, I want to sleep.”

 

Lu Han laughed and reached out for the door knob. “Alright, I’ll call to check up on you.”

 

When the door closed, I sneezed again and cuddled farther into my blankets. I didn’t feel much like sleeping anymore, it was horrible sleeping with a cold. I needed something to lull me that I didn’t have to watch. I just wanted to close my eyes. My phone was on the coffee table where I put it to charge the day before when I came home from school. Getting my hand out from the conforms of my blankets was like giving birth, but I finally freed my arm enough to reach out for the phone. I flipped through my contacts until I found the one labeled ‘phoenix’ and dialed it, putting it on speaker phone. While I waited for Chanyeol to pick up, I swallowed the tablets and sipped the tea my brother had left me.

 

“Hello?” Chanyeol’s deep voice asked. He sounded surprised someone was calling him and I chuckled.

 

“Hyung, I’m sick,” I said adding a pout at the end. I could if I wanted to.

 

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that…Sehun.”

 

“Of course it’s Sehun. Who else would call you like this?”

 

“Right, I only have you and my brothers in my phone, and they don’t answer in Korean,” Chanyeol said, laughing.

 

“I only know Korean…and a little Chinese.”

 

“I’m sure you’ll learn. So did you just call me to complain about being sick?”

 

“Pretty much,” I said and sneezed. “Ugh...what are you doing, hyung?”

 

“Hmm me?” Chanyeol asked. I heard rustling from the other line and whispering. “Baekhyun, stop it, I told you no.”

 

“Oh…Baekhyun hyung’s there…did I interrupt something?” I asked and moved my hand back in my sheets. I felt cold again.

 

“No! No, it’s nothing like that (Baekhyun stop, I told you I didn’t want to). No, Baekhyun’s just being a brat and sulking over his lover because the guy’s playing hard to get.”

 

“Aren’t they already sleeping together?”

 

I could hear Chanyeol grinned. “I think this is serious. Our Baekhyun is in love.”

 

“Am not!” Baekhyun yelled into the phone and I heard footsteps leaving and a door closed.

 

“Okay, he’s gone. Sorry about that,” Chanyeol said.

 

“It’s fine. I mean, if you wanted to, you could have helped him.”

 

Chanyeol sighed and I heard a thumping sound like someone falling back on the bed. “I don’t want to, Sehun. At one point we did like each other. He wasn’t a virgin when we did it the first time, he had had someone before me, but he wanted to try because we liked each other, but as soon as we did it, it wasn’t like that anymore. Baekhyun and I only have sex because we’re best friends and he needs it. He doesn’t like it anymore than I do.”

 

“Did you like having sex with me?” I didn’t know why it slipped out, it just did.

 

“Oh, we haven’t talked about that.”

 

“Not really. I mean, you don’t have to have sex to keep being a firebird or whatever, do you?”

 

“A phoenix, that’s the type of monster I’m classified under. No, I don’t. I’m sorry about that, I took advantage of you. It was my birthday, the next day was. I get kind of depressed around that time and you seemed sad to. I just sort of took my own birthday present from you.”

 

Depressed because he would always be stuck only weeks before turning twenty, I understood, having a birthday that wasn’t a renewed celebration of a certain birthday like I supposed the other’s were, but a reminder that you never reached the next year. “If it was your birthday, you should have told me. I’ll get you a present.”

 

“You already gave me one that’s worth a hundred more almost birthdays, Sehun,” Chanyeol said. “I have your virginity.”

 

My face went red. Maybe I should get up and turn the heater back down. “It was your first time, too, I mean like that.”

 

“Yeah, I don’t bottom with Baekhyun. It wasn’t bad, though, except when I woke up I couldn’t really walk. Baekhyun laughed at me when he found out. He doesn’t know who it was, though.”

 

“You’re not going to tell anyone?” I asked.

 

“I wasn’t the virgin. When you want to tell, we’ll tell, if you don’t then we won’t,” Chanyeol said.

 

What were we exactly telling? That I slept with my best friend’s older brother?

 

**형**

 

They walked out of the movie theatre flushed and out of breath. Lu Han let out a nervous laugh as he dropped his drink into the trash and quickly dragged Kai out on the street. Kai grinned at him and pulled on his hand to make him twirl and attempted to dip Lu Han, but the elder pushed him away laughing and went to check himself in one of the shop windows next to the theatre. He could still feel Kai’s lips against his skin, one hand rubbing his stomach and the other beneath his boxers stroking him. He could feel Kai’s warm member in his hand returning the favor and his other hand had a nice indention from where he had been biting it to keep from moaning in the dark theater. They hadn’t planned for something like that. Kai had leaned over and kissed him during a lull in the movie then kissed him again a few second later and Lu Han kissed back and kissed back again. He missed Kai’s lips and his hands and he didn’t even protest when he heard his pants being unzipped. Before he knew it, they were wiping cum off their hands instead of popcorn butter.

 

“You look fine,” Kai said and flattened some of Lu Han’s messy hair. He moved his hand and grabbed Lu Han’s, tugging him down the road. Lu Han moved closer to him, wanting to share his boyfriend’s body heat, feeling cold, though his body was still warm from his release. It was getting close to Christmas time, the late November days already bringing out the bright lights and other Christmas decorations.

 

“This way,” Kai said and pulled them into a chicken restaurant. It was warm inside and Lu Han started to pull his coat off, but felt his hands pushed out of the way as Kai did it himself, hanging it on the back of the chair. Lu Han thought Kai was being a bit reckless, but decided, since they hadn’t seen each other outside of Kai’s and Sehun’s high school, that it was fine if he was like this.

 

Lu Han let Kai order for them, staring out the window at the people walking up and down the streets. He thought he saw a few flecks but figured they wouldn’t stay. The snow from the other day had already melted away.

 

“So, how’s Sehun, did he throw a fit when you left?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han frowned and stirred his straw in the water they had been given. “He was too sick to say much. He caught a cold.”

 

“Is he going to be okay?”

 

“It’s just a cold. I’m sorry I’ve been ignoring you, Jonginnie.” Lu Han looked up and grinned sheepishly at his boyfriend.

 

Kai smiled back and reached a hand across the table taking Lu Han’s in his. “You weren’t ignoring me, you were tending to your brother.” Kai frowned. “Did you ever find out who he spent the night with?”

 

Lu Han shook his head. “No, he wouldn’t tell me, just an older guy. I feel bad about it. I didn’t think he would go to that length.”

 

“I’m sorry, too. I never meant to fall in love with my friend’s brother, but I don’t regret it at all. You’re all mine now, hyung.”

 

Lu Han smiled at Kai. “Yeah, I’m yours, and Sehun will have to learn to share me for the time. I know eventually he would loose his virginity, he’s not a bad looking boy, just unsocialable.”

 

“But to think you guys lost it on the same night.”

 

Lu Han laughed. “You’re right, I never thought about that. Maybe it was fate then. I just really hope it wasn’t a stranger, I told him to go get tested, but he said he didn’t have to, so it must be someone he knows.”

 

“I would talk to him, but we’re kind of at a stand still right now.”

 

“I know. Sehun means a lot to you, doesn’t he?” Lu Han asked.

 

Kai nodded and waited as the server came and put their food down on their table. “At first I thought maybe I was attracted to him, but that obviously wasn’t it. Just a kindred soul, I felt we were similar, I still think we are.”

 

“I think the first thing I loved about you was that you love my brother as much as I do.”

 

“Well, I never had a little brother; it’s nice having one now even if he’s angry with me at the moment.”

 

Lu Han smiled and took a quick look around before leaning over the table and placing a quick kiss against Kai’s lips. “Thank you.”

 

Kai licked his lips and grinned. “Well…you know.”

 

They were half way through their meal when Kai brought up another topic.

 

“Hyung, I have something to ask you.”

 

Lu Han looked up. “What is it?”

 

“Will you and Sehun come to my house on Christmas? I know you haven’t seen it, I’m sorry about that, but will you come.”

 

Lu Han hadn’t seen Kai’s house, he hadn’t thought to ask about it either though, it didn’t seem like a big deal to him, but he was curious. “Sure, is there any special reason other than that it’s Christmas.”

 

“I want you two to be with us for Christmas, I mean, isn’t it just the two of you?”

 

They had gone two years now on their own. Sehun had spent one of those Christmases with his father in a foreign country that Lu Han couldn’t remember and the other they had stuffed them selves into Yixing’s apartment and ate all his food.

 

“It would be nice to have a family Christmas.”

 

Kai smiled and took a bite of food before pausing. “My parents are coming.”

 

Kai’s parents. Kai hadn’t talked about them much. “I get to meet your parents?”

 

“Yeah, they said they were coming to check on us. They usually visit for Christmas. Um, just don’t be too surprised when you see them.”

 

“Why would I be surprised?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Well, you’ll see.”


	14. And Then We Have Dinner With Kai's Parents

**Chapter 14 – And Then We Have Dinner With Kai’s Parents**

 

“Sehun, are you done getting ready yet?” Lu Han yelled.

 

“I’m almost done,” I yelled back looking at myself in the mirror. I was wearing a dress shirt and slacks, a tie hung loosely around my neck that I refused to fix until we were actually at Kai’s house. My brother had it in his head that we had to dress up for this Christmas dinner with Kai and his parents. My hair was still damp and I ran a hand through it thinking I should get a trim soon.

 

“Make sure to comb your hair back,” Lu Han called.

 

I stuck my tongue out and picked up the comb parting my hair like an eight year old choir boy. I raised an eyebrow at myself; I hadn’t had my hair like this since my middle school entrance ceremony. It looked too boyish, I was sixteen, and I wasn’t a virgin either. That probably didn’t have anything to do with anything, but I ran my hands messily through my hair and instead pushed my bangs up.

 

There, that was better.

 

“Sehun, hurry up.”

 

“I’m done,” I called and walked out, finding my brother in the kitchen. He had some platter with some kind of fancy rice balls on them. “Did you really have to attempt to cook something?”

 

He threw the spoon at me, a few grains of the cooked and sticky rice clinging to my shirt. I picked them off and popped them into my mouth.

 

“I’m not going to show up at my boyfriend’s house on Christmas without an offering.

 

“But we got all of them Christmas presents, isn’t that enough?”

 

“Don’t make me throw the bowl at you, too,” Lu Han said, he always got aggressive when he was stressed. That or he would eat everything insight. He sighed and covered the platter with plastic rap then removed his apron. He wore the same thing as me, but with a tight fitting vest and there was eyeliner outlining his eyes. I thought he looked like a girl.

 

“I like your hair, Sehun, you look manly. Wear it like this more often,” Lu Han said patting my shoulder. “Grab that tray and we’ll head out. You know where Kai’s house is, right?”

 

We donned our jackets, Lu Han helping me with mine as I held the tray, and went outside. It had snowed the day before and the ground was still heavily littered with white fluff. I stayed close to Lu Han as we walked. He looked like a child all wrapped up in his gray pea coat and scarf, cheeks pink from the wind. I reached out and hooked his arm with mine and Lu Han turned a smile up at me, the corners of his eyes scrunched up and his pouty lips formed a pink line that pushed up his cheeks.

 

There was one thing about my brother that still caught me off guard – the times where he was unbearably cute. For those few seconds when he resembled the pictures of that happy child on our mother’s desktop background, I felt like the older brother and I just wanted to guard him even more, but I couldn’t.

 

We boarded the subway and Lu Han took a seat holding the tray close to his body while I stood in front of him took keep the food and him from getting squished. The cars were fuller than I would have thought for a Christmas, but still less so than usual. A while later we got off at the exit that led to Kai’s house.

 

“Oh, it’s Chanyeol,” Lu Han said and pointed across the street where Chanyeol stood jumping up and down and waving his hands around. He only wore a thin sweater and scarf and I envied his ability to freely go about in the cold.

 

We walked toward him and Chanyeol immediately clamped an arm around my shoulders, something that had become a habit every time he saw me. Lu Han smiled at him and looked around.

 

“Where’s the house?”

 

Chanyeol tried to lift up the plastic covering the food my brother made, but I moved it away from him and hissed. He grinned and removed himself from me pointing toward the trees. “That way, don’t get lost.”

 

Lu Han gave me a confused look and I pushed him in front of me so he wouldn’t lag behind. I knew that my brother had yet to be to Kai’s house and I had not told him what it was like. Kai and I had just started talking again, though it wasn’t much, just casual words in between classes and the walks home where still silent, but I wasn’t ready to talk to Lu Han about his boyfriend either. Chanyeol had told me they went to the apartment on the weekends, he tried to tell me more but I refused to hear that my brother was starting to have a regular sex life.

 

“You guys live in the woods?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Yeah, it provides enough coverage for when we feel like taking on our full forms,” Chanyeol explained.

 

“Oh, what’s your full form, Chanyeol?”

 

“Phoenix,” I answered for him.

 

Lu Han turned and hummed at me. “So Chanyeol’s the phoenix in your phone?”

 

I glared at Lu Han. “Why are you looking at my phone for?”

 

Lu Han shrugged.

 

Chanyeol laughed. “It’s my fault; we stole his phone one day and entered out numbers under aliases. Oh, Kyungsoo made a huge feast, but it’s nice you brought something, too, Lu Han hyung.”

 

“I didn’t feel right coming here without food to offer, I brought presents too. I didn’t know what to get your parents, so I just got something random. What are your parents like?” Lu Han asked.

 

“Our parents…oh, you mean Jongin’s parents…they’re good people. They can be harsh, but they’re really nice, I’m sure you’ll like them.”

 

“I can just imagine them, with really pleasant faces dressed up in comfy sweaters and loafers,” Lu Han said seeming to be in his own world.

 

“Hyung’s the only one wearing loafers,” Chanyeol said, “I think Jongin’s ‘mother’ is in boots or something. He has a thing for leather here and there.”

 

Lu Han turned his head to me. “Leather?”

 

An image of a man just a bit younger than my own father entered my thoughts decked out in bdsm gear and I shivered in disgust.

 

**형**

 

“Lu Han!”

 

Kai stood on the porch of the old white house and ran down the steps, immediately wrapping my brother in his arms and swinging him around. Lu Han laughed and patted his shoulders to let him go then pecked his lips quickly. Kai licked his lips and looked at me, nodding with a hesitant hi that I returned.

 

“They brought food and presents, Jongin, why don’t you take Lu Han to the living room to meet your parents and I’ll lead Sehun to the kitchen,” Chanyeol suggested.

 

Kai took Lu Han’s hand and pulled him into the house and I followed Chanyeol inside. We split up in the hall, my brother and Kai walking into the living room and I went into the kitchen. Suho and Kyungsoo stood at the stove, the elder of the two had an arm wrapped around Kyungsoo’s waist and it looked like he was whispering stuff into his ear. Chanyeol cleared his throat and they broke away from each other.

 

“Not that it isn’t cute seeing you two flirting or anything, but Lu Han and Sehun are here now,” Chanyeol said.

 

Kyungsoo’s face was pink, eyes large. Suho smiled brightly. I hadn’t met the older two of Kai’s brothers and I put the rice balls on the counter and bowed to him.

 

“I’m Oh Sehun, nice to meet you,” I greeted.

 

Suho reached out for my hand and shook it. “Yes of course I know who you are. We haven’t really met, but Kyungsoo and Chanyeol talk about you all the time.”

 

I took a glance at Chanyeol and saw him steal a rice ball.

 

“Chanyeol, I told you not to snack. Go watch for Kris and Tao.”

 

“Are they not here?” I asked.

 

“Ah, well, Tao’s been hanging out with that friend of your brother. I think we might have gotten a double load this time.”

 

“Triple,” Chanyeol said holding up three fingers. “Baekhyun’s got a real crush on his recent lover.”

 

“Not I don’t!” Baekhyun yelled from somewhere upstairs.

 

Kyungsoo laughed. “Yes, well, it seems we’ll be taking him in as well if Tao starts marking him. I didn’t imagine Tao getting a lover.”

 

“Tao and Kris are pretty quiet about their affairs, they’ve had them, but I only know the name Kris’ first love and that they both slept with Baekhyun,” Suho explained.

 

“They slept with Baekhyun hyung?” I asked and glanced over at Chanyeol who was frowning.

 

“I say no to him sometimes,” Chanyeol said. “When we live in places where it’s hard for him to find a lover, those two take over for me when I don’t want to.”

 

“It’s troublesome, but Baekhyun really can’t help it, and he gives more than he gets in the end,” Kyungsoo explained and turned back to the food. “Kris went to pick Tao up from his boyfriend’s, though, he spent Christmas Eve with him and they should be back any time.”

 

“I’ll go wait then,” Chanyeol said. “Sehun, you should to meet Kai’s parents.”

 

I nodded and followed Chanyeol out of the kitchen. I stared at the doorway that led into the living room. I could hear laughter, Kai’s, Lu Han’s, an unfamiliar soft one and a deep one. I peaked around the edge of the frame, but could only see the backs of his parent’s heads, a brownish red and then a dark brown like Kai’s. I knocked on the door frame before walking in.

 

“Hello?”

 

They were beautiful, I couldn’t really think of another word to describe them. The one with the dark hair looked tall and had a small handsome face with large eyes. His clothes were neat and pressed, very much like a posh young businessman. I could imagine, had he been allowed to age, his face would have made a very gentle one as an old man. The man beside him, well it was hard to refer to him as a man. He had that same appearance at first glance that Lu Han had at times, too pretty to be male, but still obviously a guy. He had a cute face and I had a sudden thought he would be what Kai and Lu Han’s children would look if Lu Han could give birth. He looked a lot like Kai, obviously his ‘mother’, the one that had fathered him, not his creator. I understood what Chanyeol meant my leather as well. He wore black jeans with rips that I was sure did not keep him warm at all in this weather, a graphic tee, and a leather jacket, his shoed were black and went almost to high to be men’s. Most of all, he looked our age.  

 

“Sehun, come meet Kai’s parents,” Lu Han said.

 

They both stood and I saw just how tall Kai’s father was, around Kris’ and Chanyeol’s height. His ‘mother’ wasn’t much shorter, maybe just a bit under me and Kai. They bowed and I bowed back trying to keep my head lower.

 

“It’s good to meet you, Sehun,” Kai’s ‘mother’ greeted, smiling, eyes in crescents, “I’m Taemin and this is my Minho.”

 

“Hello,” I said and looked over at my brother. He gestured me over and I went to stand beside him.

 

“He’s a bit shy, isn’t he,” Taemin said and laughed a bit. Minho ruffled his hair and we all sat, Kai and I sandwiching Lu Han between us on the long couch.

 

Lu Han, Kai and his parents chatted for a while. Baekhyun eventually came down and clung onto Kai and Lu Han respectably, chatting back until finally leaving to help Kyungsoo and Suho in the kitchen. I watched the fireplace, the flames twirling and swooping against each other mesmerizing as Taemin and Minho told stories about their lives as monsters and then embarrassing tales about Kai’s childhood. It turned out Taemin was nineteen and Minho twenty-one bodily. Because of their position as royal descended monsters, they often had to travel to other clusters of monsters. They had another group that they usually stayed with of five that had lived almost as long as they had. Though Kai was their son and they had established this group, they said it wasn’t their group, but Kris’ and Suho’s. They only came to visit and check up on their son.

 

The front door opened and everyone went silent. I looked away from the flame and met my brother’s curious eyes. The other three in the room stared at each other than stood up in unison. Kris entered the room and bowed to Minho and Taemin before moving aside. Tao and Chanyeol walked in after.

 

“Tao has something to say,” Chanyeol said and Tao went up to Taemin, whispering something into his ear.

 

Taemin’s face dropped and he turned to Minho to whisper on the message.

 

“What is it?” Kai asked.

 

Taemin and Minho gave Lu Han and me a careful look. Kris spoke up first.

 

“Tao felt another group of monsters loitering about Yixing’s place.”

 

“Not a group, just one person. It smelled familiar so I don’t think there will be any problem, Yixing lives at the merging line of our markings,” Tao said.

 

Merging lines, smells, they sounded like a pack of wolves or something. “What are you talking about?”

 

“The larger groups of monsters don’t like to run into each other, some of them are hostile. We’re just like a group of any kind of animal, understand?” Kai asked.

 

I nodded. Territorial. I didn’t know there were other monsters around here, though.

 

“It’s fine for now, let’s just go eat,” Minho said. “I’m sure Kyungsoo is about finished.”

 

“Food~, I haven’t had Kyungsoo’s cooking in forever, let’s go eat,” Taemin said and pulled Minho out of the living room.  

 

Lu Han went ahead saying something about helping set the table. I watched after them.

 

“What kind of monster are your parents?” I asked.

 

“Well, my dad’s…it’s kind of like a demon, strong and just scary looking. My mom’s basically a vampire,” Kai answered as he walked past me to follow Lu Han.

 

Vampire – I called it.

 

**형**

 

They giggled as they made their way upstairs. Lu Han kept looking back down the stairs behind him making sure his brother had already left. It was his first time to see Kai’s room and he was giddy to be locked up in it with his lover for the rest of Christmas. He felt bad leaving Sehun to spend the night by himself, but he had made sure to drink hot chocolate and watch a marathon of Christmas movies the night before as they devoured a cake Xiumin had bought them as a present. Sehun would be fine spending Christmas night alone.

 

“This way,” Kai said pushing open the door in the farthest corner of the second floor and pulled Lu Han inside.

 

Lu Han leaned against the door and locked it. He looked around and thought Kai’s room looked cozy. He was smaller than his and Sehun’s, but everything fit. His bed was large; he had a desk, a shelf, and a closet. His dressers were built into the bottom of the bed. Everything was dark wood and black. Lu Han moved to sit on the end of Kai’s bed, running his hand along the smooth black sheets tucked neatly under the mattress.

 

Kai moved to sit on the other end of the bed, legs crossed and he hugged his pillow to his chest as he leaned back against the wall. “Are you sure it’s okay to let your brother go home alone?”

 

“He’ll be fine. I told him I wasn’t going home tonight before we left. He knows we’ve been having sex, and he can’t really say anything about it.”

 

“Because he did, too?” Kai asked.

 

Lu Han nodded. “He still hasn’t said who it was. I don’t think he’s done it again, but it worries me.”

 

Kai moved the pillow away and reached out for Lu Han. The elder smiled and crawled across the bed to sit in his lover’s lap and let Kai’s arms hold him against his warmth.

 

“How did you like my parents?” Kai asked.

 

“They were nice, really young looking. Do monsters ever look old?” I asked.

 

“After a couple hundred years they do, my parents will probably start aging again in the coming century.”

 

Lu Han rested his head on Kai’s shoulder and smiled. “They were nice. I hope they’ll look at me like their own son.”

 

He felt Kai’s lips press against his hair, finger playing with the strands at the base of his neck. “Of course they will.”

 

“I never had parents. I met my birth father once when I was five or six. I haven’t heard from him since, I don’t even know of he’s married or if I have another brother or sister somewhere in China. I know he’s in China though.”

 

“I’ve…never heard you talk about your parents before, hyung,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han bit his lip and sighed. “I don’t really like to think about it, but since I met your parents, I thought I would tell you. I lived with my grandmother since I was born. I think my mother stayed with me until I was two or three and then she went back to Korea and quickly got married and had Sehun. I was an accident. We both were, actually, but Sehun was a happy accident. Our mother sent me lots of things and pictures and I lived happily with my grandmother. She made sure I went to a school that wouldn’t judge me on being half and I became really interested in Korean culture. I taught myself how to speak it.”

 

Kai moved a hand to Lu Han’s back and he sighed as he felt him rub up and down his spine comforting. “My grandmother was old so she started getting really sick my last year of middle school so I came to live with my mother. Sehun’s dad was perfectly fine with it; he knew about me, Sehun did, too. He tried to treat me like his son, but it was just difficult I suppose. We didn’t know our mom was already depressed then. She wanted me to live with my little brother, but I guess my presence reminded her of the years she lived disgraced for having a child like me at such a young age. She left, just one day at the end of my junior year I came home and found Sehun sitting on the couch curled up with a note for our father. He had seen her leave just as he had gotten home from school. His father really loved our mother, so it was a struggle for the next year for us to all live happily together. He really couldn’t take it, seeing us, because we both take after her. He discussed it with me and I agreed to take over guardianship of Sehun as soon as I was old enough and then he left and Sehun and I moved into that apartment together and we’ve been living there since.”

 

“I’m sorry, Lu Han,” Kai said.

 

Lu Han sat up and smiled at Kai. “It’s alright, I’m happy now. When I first came here I was called a monster by the other students, but now I really will be a monster and I’m happy with that.”

 

Kai placed his hands on Lu Han’s face, cupping it and brought him in for a soft kiss. “I love you, Lu Han.”

 

Lu Han steadied himself on Kai’s chest and smiled into the kiss. “I love you, too. Sometimes a feel a bit flustered, needy. Is that part of the transformation, or is that just you?”

 

Kai chuckled. “I would hope it was just me, but, yes that’s part of it. We don’t usually change someone unless we plan to be with them. I’ll take care of it for you, hyung.”

 

Kai’s hands moved beneath Lu Han’s shirt, the vest having been discarded in the kitchen earlier after helping Kyungsoo in the kitchen. With the top few buttons undone. Lu Han moved his hands underneath the soft material of Kai’s sweater to warm his hands on his lover’s abs. He leaned forward and their lips connected, kiss more heated than the one before and Lu Han moved his hands up and down and his hips bucked up against Kai’s in slow shy movements. Lu Han could still count how many times they made love on his hands, but everything that came before was a frequent occurrence when they got somewhere alone together, the most frequent being at the high school on Thursdays though that wouldn’t be happening from now on since Lu Han had finished his internship there.

 

“Lu Han, pants,” Kai said for the second he separated their lips.

 

Lu Han moved his hands from the warmth of his lover’s abs and began to unbutton his pants, moving a hand inside them and Kai’s boxers to stroke Kai, sliding his long thin fingers up and down the hot flesh.

 

Kai removed his shirt and snaked his tongue inside Lu Han’s mouth, tugging the elder’s out to play as he made for Lu Han’s pants, pushing them and his boxers off his hips and he moved a finger teasingly along Lu Han’s bare crack. Lu Han jumped and broke their battle. He shimmied his pants off and moved up Kai’s body, towering over him. Lu Han tilted Kai’s head up beneath his chin with one hand and moved his dark bangs back. Kai’s plump lips were parted, breathing heavily, fangs poking out. His eyes wavered unsteadily beneath his half closed lids with pleasure before they settled up on Lu Han and turned full black. Lu Han licked his lips, a strange purr rippling through his body and he got a glimpse of his own eyes reflected in Kai’s—black.

 

Lu Han leaned down and captured Kai’s lips with his, resuming the battle again, fangs now scratching at their lips. Things like this had begun to happen recently, just small little changes. Kai had told him the real transformation would not occur until later and it could take as long as a century for Lu Han to get his full form, but he would stop aging as soon as he had mastered his power – hall monsters had one particular power to define them like Chanyeol’s fire and Kai’s teleporting.

 

It wasn’t long before Lu Han felt Kai’s fingers, covered in cold gel, slid into his whole, one at a time. The squishing sound they made massaging and stretching him had become a sound Lu Han enjoyed in their love making, it made him needier for that connection with Kai and he moaned to encourage his boyfriend to continue, to do more, to drive him crazy. Kai returned the pleas with kisses along Lu Han’s neck. Lu Han had spent the last few weeks with a clear white neck other then the pierced marks on his neck that Kai said would take a few years to fade, but not because Kai had finished biting him. Across his pale body, purple love marks and more red dots from Kai’s piercing teeth littered his body. These ones faded quicker than the first three Kai had given him, whether that was because they were only normal bites or because his changing body healed him quicker he didn’t know, but, like a present, Kai decided to once again pay heed to Lu Han’s neck.

 

“Ah…Kai! Please~,” Lu Han moaned. “Bite me.”

 

Those sharp dangerous fangs pierced into the skin on Lu Han’s shoulders that he had been painting with dark pink hickeys followed by the hard bite of the rest of his teeth bruising the pale skin. He began to suck on the red drops that leaked from the wound and Lu Han wanted to cum, but he couldn’t, not until Kai was inside him riding out the end of his orgasm.

 

“Inside, Jongin,” Lu Han commanded with a moan and Kai’s fingers slipped out of him.

 

Lu Han nibbled on his bottom lip as he felt the tip of Kai’s member pressing against his entrance then took a big breath as his muscles were breached by that thick hot flesh. Sounds escaped him feeling Kai’s pulse inside his body and he buried his face in the mop of black hair next to him.

 

“Move,” Lu Han said, lips against Kai’s ear and the younger released his hold on Lu Han’s shoulder.

 

Kai’s hands pressed Lu Han down by his hips every time he thrust up into him. Lu Han held tight around Kai’s neck, swiveling his hips and trying his best to ride Kai well sitting in his lover’s lap. He didn’t know what it was – love, young hormones, or his change – but Lu Han always felt so lost in his mind like this and he loved. His mind was in a million places of pleasure, but his body, his body was where it belonged: in Kai’s embrace.

 

“Lu Han,” Kai moaned and brought their lips together hard.

 

Lu Han didn’t even care that Kai’s fangs pricked his mouth, didn’t care he would have to buy another tube of Chap Stick because of it; he kissed back just as hard, the pool in his stomach about to overflow. He felt Kai’s release coat him, his younger lover moaning a mantra of his name and screamed as the coils let loose and ribbons shot out between them. 


	15. In Which I Understand Kai

**Chapter 15 – In Which I Understand Kai**

 

 

Chanyeol had to drag me out of the house as I glared up the stairs at my brother and Kai. I knew he was supposed to stay the night and I knew why, but my legs still refused to move.

 

“Come on Sehun, I know you ate a lot of Kyungsoo’s cooking, but I’m sure you didn’t eat enough to make you immobile,” Chanyeol said as he pulled me down the hall and to the front door.

 

It was dark outside and snow was falling in thin sheets. A part of me wanted to hurry and go home to wrap myself in my sheets and eat all of Yixing’s food he left us the day before that we weren’t allowed to touch until Christmas. Another part wished the snow would fall in a blizzard so I would have to stay. That part of me that was still a child just wanted to run in the white snow and throw a snowball at Chanyeol.

 

 When we were outside, Chanyeol let go of his grip on my arm and moved it to my hand, fingers lying against mine, but not entwined. I stared down at our hands, little snowflakes landing on them, melting quicker on Chanyeol’s than mine. My hand felt wet by the time we reached the trees, but warm.

 

The walk through the woods was silent, the trees holding up the falling snow above our heads. I put my other hand in my pocket and clutched at my rolled up gloves hidden there. I could have put them on, but the hand Chanyeol was holding felt warm so I left it until we reached the sidewalk across from the subway exit. I tugged my hand. Chanyeol wouldn’t let go of it.

 

I turned to Chanyeol. “Hyung, is there something you need?”

 

Chanyeol smiled at me and started across the street. “I’m going home with you.”

 

I followed after trying not to be tugged along by his grip on my hand. It was a bit tight and shaky. “I didn’t know this.”

 

“Of course, I didn’t tell anyone.”

 

“Why are you coming home with me?”

 

“To give you your Christmas present.” He dug into his jean pocket with his free hand for his subway card.

 

“Your family already gave Lu Han and me a present. I don’t have anything to give you in return,” I said and looked up at the clock. There were still a few minutes before the train would come.

 

“Well, this is the sort of present we can each other and enjoy,” he said.

 

“Oh,” I said. “I thought that was a one time thing.”

 

“I never intended for it to be,” Chanyeol said and turned to face me, a soft smile on his face.

 

I stared at him a while. The lines of his face turned from soft to hard and masculine again as his smile grew and then contorted.

 

“I took advantage of you last time, but this time you can say yes because you want to or we can just go to your house and play video games and I may or may not crash on your couch.”

 

The train pulled up. “I don’t really feel like playing video games.”

 

I led Chanyeol onto the train, moving my fingers so they laced together almost like mirrors, my hands only slightly smaller than Chanyeol’s, hidden within the throng of people pushing inside the cart.

 

When we got to my apartment, Chanyeol followed behind me up the stairs to my bedroom.

 

“I’ve never seen upstairs,” he said.

 

I pointed to Lu Han’s door. “That’s Lu Han’s room. He has a small studio in there. Ask him one day to let you be a model.”

 

“I’ve done modeling before, with Kai, I’d be happy to help.”

 

I pushed opened my door and took a quick glance inside before opening it and letting Chanyeol through. “I know it looks weird, but don’t pay attention to anything.”

 

“How am I not going to pay attention to anything?” Chanyeol asked walking around my room and picking up one of the random knick knacks scattered across the surfaces of my desk and dressers – a blue and white statue of a girl.

 

“They were my mom’s things. I kept a few of them when she left.”

 

Chanyeol put the small china statue back onto my desk. “She left?”

 

I took my jacket off and folded it over the end post of my bed. “Yeah, she couldn’t handle seeing the child she abandoned and decided to just abandon us all.”

 

“That’s kind of bad of her, isn’t it? I mean, monster mothers aren’t necessarily with their children for long, but they still check up on them.”  
  


I shrugged. “She was a good mother to me up until she left.”

 

Chanyeol moved over to my bed and sat, bouncing. He moved his head and caught my eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to ruin the mood, but do you still want to?”

 

I looked around the room, at the china statues and other small items stashed in random corners. I had gotten over my mother’s sudden disappearance. Whatever relationship I had had with her had began to lessen when Lu Han showed up. I had always thought it was because I became so obsessed with the pretty older boy that I had only seen pictures of, but sometimes I wonder if maybe she had been depressed since the beginning and that’s why I turned to Lu Han.

 

“Yeah, I still want to.”

 

Chanyeol pulled his sweater over his head and dropped it on the floor. He reached for his pants and unbuttoned them then leaned back. “Help me,” he said lifting his hips off the bed to move his boxers and pants down his hips.

 

I grabbed the hem of Chanyeol’s pants and they pulled off easily. I dropped them with his shirt and began to undress as well as Chanyeol situated himself on the bed. I stood at the end of the bed and looked down at him trying not to shiver and the chilly air inside my room.

 

“What do I do now?”

 

Chanyeol grinned up at me. “You get on me first.”

 

I moved onto the bed and hovered over Chanyeol. He looked a bit surprised at the view. I was pretty taken aback too, looking down at Kai’s naked older brother and felt myself twitch. “Now what?”

 

Chanyeol placed his warm hands on my thighs moving them up and down. It was probably supposed to be comforting, but it just made me hard. “Do whatever you want, Sehun.”

 

I nodded and let my eyes roam down from his face and chest until they landed on his member standing almost perfectly erect. I reached a hand out and started moving it up and down. This much I figured I could do without any guidance. Wasn’t it the same as touching yourself? I moved my thumb against the tip and watched it let a small bead spill.

 

“Sehun…you hand is…” Chanyeol started to say, but he lifted his own hand to stifle a cuss.

 

I grinned at him and moved my eyes to his chest again. One of his nipples was erect and I licked my lips. He said I could do whatever I wanted. I leaned down, took a quick glance at Chanyeol’s face covered mostly by his hand, and licked the red-brown bud. Chanyeol moaned and arched into my hand and I continued to lick it. It felt weird against my tongue, the bumpy texture around the tiny peak. I pressed my lips around it and sucked and Chanyeol finally removed his hand from his face clutching it into my hair instead.

 

I lifted my head as much as Chanyeol’s hand would let me and looked at him. His lips were parted and eyes glazed over staring at the ceiling. I shifted a bit up, my hand still moving on his member, but slower (I didn’t know how long Chanyeol could last, but I knew I was usually on the edge when it was just myself by now). Chanyeol’s neck was long and I moved my lips against it, kissing his Adam’s apple then licking a circle around it. Chanyeol made a noise, it didn’t sound negative so I licked a line along his neck making it glistened wet.

 

Chanyeol laughed.

 

“S-Sehun, stop…it tickles.”

 

I lifted away from his neck, pulling my tongue back inside my mouth. His cheeks were flushed and he was smiling, but it looked strained as if fighting against another expression. I stopped moving my hand and his face relaxed.

 

“Thank you, I was about to come. The lubes in my pant pocket,” Chanyeol said.

 

I looked at him curiously and he darted his eyes toward his pile of clothes on the floor. I got off the bed and dug through his pants until I found the small bottle of clear liquid and looked back at the bed. Chanyeol had his knees up and legs spread. His head was turned toward me, watching me, arms throw about him lazily. He smiled at me softly and I swallowed hard.

 

“Do you need instructions?” he asked, a tease.

 

I shook my head and moved to settle between his legs. “I just start putting my fingers in, right?”

 

Chanyeol shook his head. “I thought that, but it’s really not. Baekhyun always did it himself…um; I practiced so I can do it for you if you want.”

 

I shook my head again both in answer and to get the images of Chanyeol preparing himself out of my head. Did he think about Baekhyun when he did it? Did he think about me? I was the only one that had been inside him, he said.  “No, I want to do it.”

 

“Okay, just coat your fingers and start with one. I’ll tell you when to add the second and just stretched and loosen, understood?”

 

I nodded and popped the lid of the bottle, coating my fingers in the slimy liquid. I looked between Chanyeol’s legs and pushed one of his thighs so his legs were spread farther. His whole twitched and I bit the side of my cheek to twitch. Lu Han always thought I imagined the same thing as he did when I masturbated, but this was actually how I envisioned it particularly after my first time with Chanyeol. I wanted to watch my partner twitch beneath my hands, move inside of them. I never imagined my partner to be someone like Chanyeol…I never really imagined my partner period.

 

Chanyeol instructed me through the stretching until I had three fingers inside him, thrusting and curling, grazing what I figured was his prostate by his loud moans that he had given up trying to silence. Oddly, I thought if felt good just having my fingers inside him, I could feel everything, feel him wanting more – as long as I didn’t think about where my fingers actually were.

 

“Okay, okay Sehun. I want you now,” Chanyeol said, his hips jerking with the movements of my fingers.

 

I frowned, just having started to find it fun watching him become needy like that, but saying he wanted me – “I want you now” – something inside me turned on and I removed my fingers and pressed the tip of my member at his entrance. We made eye contact for a second before he nodded and I was buried inside his heat again. My mouth fell wide open at the initial sheathing, the sheer pleasure overwriting my brain for a moment, and my body shook as I tried not to move, Chanyeol’s fingers reaching out and barely pressing against my face reminding me that it hurt for him. I counted in my head to calm myself down. I had gone the first time without a premature ejaculation, but Chanyeol hadn’t felt this warm then. He felt so warm. Was it because of his power?

 

“Go.”

 

It was a short simple command. I barely heard it before my hips were moving of their own accord. It was just so hot; I couldn’t control myself as I mercilessly moved my hips.

 

“S-Sehun, slow down…deeper, harder, slower,” Chanyeol said.

 

I groaned and reigned myself back in obeying what he said. I moved my hips back and forward with hard movements trying to reach for something inside of him and tried not to be erratic with it. It did feel better like this. It didn’t feel like I was just slamming into something that felt good, I could actually feel Chanyeol tighten around me, feel his pulse against the throbbing of my member.

 

It was like making love.

 

Chanyeol’s low moans floated into my ears like a sex song. It wasn’t the needy high pitched sound on a lot of the jgv I watched, this was real. Chanyeol felt me and liked it, head thrown back, orange hair, curly today, wet with sweat and in a tangled mess against the pillows. His lips were parted and as he began to move his hips needy with mine, I leaned forward. His eyes barely had time to focus on my face only centimeters from his before I kissed him.

 

Chanyeol gasped. I opened my eyes for a second to see his wide, surprised, almost scared eyes, before they closed and he pressed his lips back. My first kiss. I wondered if it was his, too, but I didn’t think so. I moved my tongue between his lips and was met with his own in a messy struggle of wet muscle that attempted to copy the movements of our hips. Eventually I gave up, too hard to breath through my nose with all the other pleasure, and I moved my lips along his jaw and to his neck. I didn’t think about the consequences, but I wanted to attempt to make a hickey on the long expanse of skin.

 

“S-Sehun…d-don’t,” Chanyeol tried to say, but his hands pushed my face down more against his neck, hands tangled in my hair, hips moving more and I could tell he was close, I was trying my best to hold on as well. His cry of release was short, more of a pleasured pain than anything on my part as he yanked my head to the side and attacked my neck, finger nails like talons as they scratched down from my neck to my back. I winced when he bit me and then I felt a prick in my skin and my whole body shook. I came.

 

**형**

 

Lu Han sat in the corner of the café flipping through the recent issue of his favorite kpop magazine. A mug of steaming coffee clinked onto the table in front of him and he looked up, smiling gratefully at his friend. Xiumin placed his own drink down on the booth table and took his seat across from Lu Han. He picked at the brightly colored piece of winter cake they shared and stared out the window at the white covered streets and let Lu Han finish the article he was reading.

 

“So you don’t usually call me out just to hang in a café in winter, Lu Han. Usually our winter routines without Yixing are soccer in the snow, so what’s up?” Xiumin asked and pushed the cake toward Lu Han.

 

Lu Han picked up his fork and pried a piece off from it, slipping it between his lips. “Maybe I did call Lay, but he’s on a date today.”

 

Xiumin leaned back in the booth and took a sip of his coffee. “Yes, he’s been abandoning us lately, hasn’t he? I think it might have been a little better when he was dating girls.”

 

Lu Han could tell it was a joke and laughed before sipping his own drink, sighing as the warm liquid slid down his throat. “I’m glad he’s happy. He never seemed all that happy with the girls he dated, I felt like they were taking advantage of him.”

 

“And this Tao isn’t? I hear their dates consist of shopping and then going back to Yixing’s place to eat and then have sex. That was basically what he did with the girls he dates, right?”

 

“I never really listened to what he said about his girlfriends,” Lu Han said and grimaced. Put that way, it did sound bad, but he knew Tao, or at least was starting to know him, and he knew Yixing. “I suppose he does take advantage of Lay, but unlike with the girls, what Tao takes he can return.”

 

“Because he’s a guy?” Xiumin asked.

 

Lu Han nodded. “He teaches wushu even though he’s still in high school. He’s very good at it; Kai took me to watch him one day. Tao can take care of him just as much as he does. I think it’s good.”

 

“They’ll be like husband and wife,” Xiumin joked and took another bite of cake. “You and Kai aren’t like husband and wife at all. You’re like playmates.”

 

“I don’t need the same things that Yixing does. I don’t need someone to protect me, I need someone to just understand me and love me,” Lu Han said and stared into the surface of his coffee with a soft smile. “I found where I belonged, you could say.”

 

Xiumin scoffed. “Love struck much.”

 

Lu Han laughed. “Of course, but Kai is, too.”

 

His friend rested his head on his hand and went back to looking out the window. “You all sound perfect together, but not everyone that belongs to each other can stay together.”

 

“I know,” Lu Han said. He remembered Sehun’s father. He truly loved their mother and kept check on her through one of her friends. Lu Han told him to go after her, but Sehun’s father just said he loved their mother enough to over look everything she ever did and let her live as she wanted – she wanted to get married when she got pregnant so they did, she wanted Lu Han to live with them so he allowed it, she wanted to leave so he wouldn’t make her stay.

 

“It makes me a bit jealous,” Xiumin laughed.

 

“Don’t be jealous, everyone likes Baozi,” Lu Han joked. “You could get a date easily.”

 

Xiumin took a long drawl of his coffee and let out an exaggerated sigh. “I wrote off dating a long time ago, Lu Han.”

 

Lu Han frowned. Xiumin and he had gone to high school together, but it wasn’t until their last year when they were put in the same class that they became friends. The other lived alone in an apartment where he still lived today and had never dated as long as Lu Han had been his friend. He asked him why once and Xiumin simply answered that his heart was not his but someone else’s broken pieces and they had his broken heart as well.

 

Xiumin stretched his arms above his head and smiled at Lu Han. “Anyways, you obviously wanted to talk about more than you and Kai though you know how thrilled I would be at hearing your sex stories. And I’m the one who brought up Yixing, so what is it? We don’t just get coffee without playing soccer unless you’re having troubles.”

 

He wasn’t really sure how to phrase what he had to say. Lu Han hadn’t brought up the subject of his brother’s sudden sex life with his friends yet.

 

“It’s my brother.”

 

“It always is.”

 

Lu Han rolled his eyes. “I’m worried about him. I’ve tried my best to maintain a good relationship with him while still dating Kai, but he’s so stubborn. Kai asked me to leave their relationship to each other, but it feels like he’s distancing himself from me as well.”

 

“How so?” Xiumin asked.

 

“The night I lose my virginity,” Lu Han said and twirled his mug in his hands, “Sehun lost his as well.”

 

“Did you have some kind of threesome?”

 

Lu Han picked at the cake and threw a crumb at his friend, glaring. “Stop joking, I’m serious.” He leaned back in his seat and sighed. “I went to the apartment and he wasn’t there. Sometimes he does that because he doesn’t like being awake in the apartment alone at night, but then he didn’t come home. He had sex with someone.”

 

“Do you know who?”

 

He shook his head. “Sehun just said they were older than him and that he topped. He wouldn’t tell me anything more.”

 

“That was a while ago though, what’s the reason you’re bringing it up now?”

 

“Christmas night we had dinner with Kai’s family. I stayed and Sehun went home. When I came back in the morning, I went to check on him. Usually he wakes up and then falls asleep on the couch watching cartoons when I’m not there. He was naked…he had long scratches down his back.”

 

“Your brother likes the kinky stuff then.”

 

Lu Han groaned. “Oh gosh, don’t make me think of my little brother like that. Even if he isn’t the one being penetrated, it hurts me to think he might be being hurt while having sex. He got angry at me when I woke him up. It took me hours to convince him to let me clean them. He had bite marks, too.”

 

“Bite…marks?” Xiumin asked.

 

Lu Han could feel his eyes travel to his neck and lifted a hand to rub his neck then remembered he had covered it with make up that morning. “I just wish he would tell me who it is. I’m happy if he has a lover, but if he’s someone’s play thing, I can’t handle that.”

 

“What about you? He probably worries about you, too, you know.”

 

“I know, I thought about that, but it’s different. Kai and I told him from the beginning that we liked each other. He knew before we did. Honestly it’s his fault we dated so soon. I was going to tell Kai no, but that little brat pulled that trick…ugh, remembering it makes me embarrassed.”

 

Xiumin laughed. “Well, Sehun is growing up you know. No matter how much you two seem obsessed with each other you’re going to start drifting apart.”

 

Of course Lu Han knew that. He bit his lip wondering how much longer he had with Sehun. It was getting close to that dangerous period Kai told him about. He wanted to always watch out for Lu Han and that meant not being around him for a time.

 

**형**

 

Winter break was short and I planned to spend it curled up on the couch watching cartoons and variety shows everyday until my eyes hurt. Lu Han was out of the house with his friends, He said he hadn’t been able to hang out with all three of them because Yixing was always with Tao. I asked if they were going to have a girl’s day. He threw his spoon at me.

 

My eyes began to hurt a lot sooner than I thought. It was only a few days after Christmas that I watched my brother walk out of the house to meet his friends. My first thought was to call up Kai and have a boy’s day. Then I remembered I was only ‘okay’ with Kai. Yet, I still thought about him at times like this. We weren’t friends for long, but it was long enough for me to start to miss him. I admitted it to myself – that I missed hanging out with Kai. It wasn’t so bad when I didn’t have to see him, but I did. At lunch I saw Kai because I couldn’t stay away from Kyungsoo’s food. At home I saw him because I couldn’t stay away from my brother (he had started coming over to watch movies with us and he and Lu Han played video games), At his house, I saw Kai because I couldn’t stay away from Chanyeol.

 

I thought about calling Chanyeol. I thought about asking him if he wanted to come over and play video games. Then afterwards, before Lu Han came home, we could have sex again. I wondered if it was impolite to ask that. He said he wanted it to be more than a one time thing. Did that mean it was a more than two time thing?

 

My phone rang. I unwrapped myself from my blankets and reached out toward the coffee table and answered my phone.

 

“Hello?”

 

Harsh breathing answered me followed by Kai’s voice. “I’m coming over to your apartment.” His voice was deep, gritty. The line died before I could say anything else.

 

I stared at my phone; eyebrows furrowed, and started to flick through my contacts. I was about to push Chanyeol’s to ask him why Kai was coming over when he texted me. Then again and again and again.

 

**To Sehun**

**From** **Phoenix**

**I’m sorry.**

 

**Lu Han told his friends about finding you after Christmas.**

**One of them told Tao. Baekhyun heard them.**

**He teased me about it in front of everyone.**

 

**The scratches, I did that to Baekhyun a few times.**

**I scratched your back.**

 

**He put two and two together.**

 

**Baekhyun’s trying to stop him.**

 

**To** **Phoenix**

**From Sehun**

**Who?**

 

**To Sehun**

**From** **Phoenix**

**Kai knows.**

 

I stared at my phone not really understanding. Kai knows…what did he know? Scratches. Lu Han had bothered me about the scratches on my back when he found me the day after Christmas in bed. I looked around trying to find Chanyeol, but it looked like he left sometime after we fell asleep naked. He held me like I was some kind of teddy bear, but I got over it because he was warm. We didn’t have blankets on so he must have covered me when he left.

 

I heard a knock on the door and swallowed.

 

Kai.

 

“Sehun, let me in! We need to talk.”

 

He sounded angry. Why was he angry?

 

“It’s unlocked.”

 

The door knob clicked opened and I heard Kai walk inside and shut it. He took off his shoes before his angry footsteps made their way towards me, loud even on the carpeted floor.

 

“Oh Sehun, what did you do to my brother?” Kai growled.

 

I took a breath and turned around, meeting his hard gaze with a glare of my own. “What do you want Kai?”

 

“I just asked you a question, Sehun.”

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I clutched my phone in my hand.

 

Kai laughed, dark, haughty. “Are you stupid, Sehun? I saw Chanyeol texting before I came here. I teleported, it takes me less than a second to get from my house to your door.”

 

I looked down at my phone. It dinged, Chanyeol still trying to send me texts.

 

**To Sehun**

**From** **Phoenix**

**Are you alright?**

 

I put my phone down on the table. “Stay out of it, Kai.”

 

I didn’t expect Kai to grab me by the collar of my shirt. He moved his face close to mine and his eyes went black.

 

“He’s my brother,” Kai growled. “He is my business.”

 

The words left my mouth before I could really think about them. “And Lu Han is mine.”

 

He shook my by his hold on my shirt. “Is this some kind of payback for me and Lu Han? Don’t screw with my brother like that!”

 

He threw me back and I fell across the coffee table. I rolled onto my back and slid to the floor only to have Kai straddle my lap and grab my collar again. “Don’t play with him like that. He gets enough shit because of Baekhyun.”

 

I glared up at him. “I wasn’t playing with him. He’s the one that asked _me_.”

 

“I don’t give a crap who asked who? I want to know what you’re doing sleeping with my brother.”

 

Sleeping withy his brother. I was sleeping with Kai’s brother.

 

“You sleep with my brother.”

 

Kai shook me again. I heard something rip and looked down to see his nails sharp and black torn through my shirt. He growled bringing my attention to his lips, fangs pressed into their plush fullness.

 

“You’re such a brat!”

 

“Stop calling me that!” I tried to push him off.

 

“Then stop acting like one!”

 

He finally let go of me and moved to sit on the couch. He buried his head in his hands and sighed. “I really can’t understand you, Sehun. Lu Han and I told you from the very beginning how we felt. You knew every step of our relationship. We didn’t want to exclude you, make you feel like we were keeping something from you, so why couldn’t you tell us about Chanyeol and you?”

 

“There isn’t anything. We just had sex a couple times.”

 

Kai’s hand reached out. At first I thought he might slap me, but instead he pushed my head to the side and ran the fingers of his other hand along my neck. “Dang it Sehun, he bit you. This is serious.”

 

I knew Chanyeol had bitten me. It hadn’t really bothered me until I was lying on my back with Lu Han dabbing at the scratches he made that I remembered what they meant. I tried not to think about it.

 

“Sehun, you knew my attentions toward your brother. Now it’s your turn to tell me yours. What do you want from Chanyeol?”

 

Slowly, I straightened myself out. I rubbed my neck and closed my eyes. I remembered the morning in the kitchen when I found Kai in just his boxers right after he slept with Lu Han for the first time…right after I lost my virginity to Chanyeol. I had sex with my best friend’s brother.

 

I felt stupid.

 

“I don’t have any intentions, Kai.”

 

“Sehun, don’t use my brother. I’m not using yours, I love Lu Han.”

 

“I know,” I said and looked up at the ceiling. “I might like him. I don’t know right now. He’s nice, he’s warm, he’s your brother…shit, he’s your brother.”

 

I brought my arm to my eyes. I didn’t want Kai to see me like this. “I’m stupid.”

 

Kai chuckled. “Did you just now figure that out?”

 

I groaned. Kai moved from the couch and came to sit next to me. I felt one of his arms wrap around my shoulders and pull me into him.

 

“You don’t have to do the comforting thing.”

 

“Shut up, Sehun; what do you think best friends are for?”

 

“They’re for sleeping with each other’s brothers apparently.”

 

“You can crack jokes when you’re crying?”

 

I turned my head so he couldn’t see my face. “I’m not crying.”


	16. And Then I Don't Go On A Date

**Chapter 16 – And Then I Don’t Go On a Date**

 

 

Lu Han took me out for Bubble Tea the next day. I stared at him across the table the whole time as I sipped on the straw chewing the gummy bobas when they popped up. He read a book flipping the pages with his thumb as he sipped on his own drink with his other hand. It wasn’t an unfamiliar site sitting like this across from my brother, but it wasn’t something we had been doing often recently because of Kai. Lu Han was supposed to be on a date with him right now. He asked me when I finally rolled off the couch that morning, more like he stated, if I had made up with Kai. I guessed I had, I didn’t feel as hostile toward him now. I would be a hypocrite if I was, so I just shrugged and my brother grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the house still in my pajama bottoms saying he had cancelled his date with Kai.

 

He wanted something, he just hadn’t said and I didn’t want to ask.

 

My straw made that empty sucking sound at I frowned at my dirty see-through cup. Lu Han lowered his book and smiled at me. He put his drink down and laced his fingers together, elbows on the table. I felt like a rat cornered by the cat.

 

“So, how are those scratches doing?” Lu Han asked.

 

I shifted in my seat and tried not to reach back and scratch the thin scabs on my back. “They’re not infected or anything.”

 

Lu Han nodded still smiling and moved his eyes to my neck. I tried to turn my head to the side so he wouldn’t be able to see the red spots and light purple around them.

 

“The bite mark isn’t gone,” he observed.

 

“Neither are yours.” I bit my lip understanding what I said now that it was lingering between us.

 

Lu Han beamed. “So it really was Chanyeol?”

 

I groaned and sucked on my straw pretending there was still some to drink. Lu Han reached across the table and tore the cup away from me.

 

“It’s empty, Sehun. Answer me.”

 

I leaned back in the seat and crossed my arms, starring down at the table. Lu Han kicked me and I yelped earning us glares from the people around.

 

“Kai’s already told me,” Lu Han said glaring at me.

 

I waited for the other customers to turn away before looking up at Lu Han, rubbing my kicked leg against my other one. “Then I don’t have to tell you anything if Kai’s already tattled.”

 

“It would be nice to hear it from my own brother.”

 

“You kicked me,” I said and pulled my let up to rub it.

 

“I’ll kick you again if you don’t talk to me.”

 

“It really hurts.”

 

“Stop acting like a baby. Obviously, you aren’t anymore.”

 

I rolled my eyes and finally looked at my brother. I thought he would be glaring at me, but he had an almost passive look on, tired like. Was he tired of dealing with me? Had I really been that bad?

 

“We only had sex twice.”

 

“With Chanyeol? Why?”

 

I shrugged and reached out to steal Lu Han’s drink. He let me and I poked around for the gummy black pearls. “I don’t know, we just did.”

 

“Who initiated it?”

 

“Chanyeol I guess. He asked me.”

 

“And you said yes?” Lu Han pulled the drink back to him and took a sip before letting me have it again.

 

I peeked up at my brother. “I didn’t say no.”

 

Lu Han raised a brow. “I don’t need to talk to Chanyeol, do I? Did he take advantage of you?”

 

“Yeah, but not in a bad way; you and Kai were going to have sex…he just offered to show me I didn’t really care about that.”

 

“You don’t care that I had sex?” Lu Han asked.

 

I sipped the drink, the Taro flavor a bit odd with the chocolate that still coated my tongue. “I do, but it wasn’t really about that. I don’t want to talk about that.”

 

“We’ll talk about _that_ someday, though, Sehun.”

 

“Probably.” I took another sip.

 

“Tell me about Christmas,” Lu Han said.

 

“Chanyeol said he was coming home with me. We could do whatever I wanted and that was one of the choices. We just went with the flow, hyung.”

 

“Well that flow better be more than playing around. He took your virginity, are you getting anything out of this?”

 

I groaned and ruffled my hair. I didn’t think it was really any of his business the details of Chanyeol’s and my hardly existent sex life. “He slept with Baekhyun, but it was a different position.”

 

“So he gave you his butt virginity?” Lu Han laughed.

 

“Something like that.”

 

Lu Han sighed. “I don’t want to think bad about Chanyeol. I have always thought he was a really good person, very cheerful. But, I don’t know his intentions toward you and yours to him?”

 

“I don’t know my intentions toward Chanyeol. I told Kai that.” Lu Han’s glass made that empty airy sound through the straw and I frowned and pushed the empty glass away from me.

 

“What about his intentions to you?”

 

I put my head down on the table and stared at the purple remnants in Lu Han’s glass. “I know they are good intentions.”

 

“He bit you.”

 

“It was just an accident. I did something too good I guess.”

 

Lu Han laughed airily. I felt his hand plop on top of my head and he ruffled my hair. “Do you like him, Sehun?”

 

“Chanyeol? Hmm, maybe a little.”

 

“Why just a little?”

 

I didn’t look up to see that Lu Han was looking at me with amusement, his eyes twinkling as if he knew something I had yet to comprehend. My lips parted and words just started spilling out.

 

“He’s nice. He tries to cheer me up a lot,” – something that Chanyeol probably didn’t know I had noticed. I had, that’s why I always thought to call him first when it came to issues with Kai. “He’s warm, I mean he’s a fire bird, and I don’t like it when it’s hot, but he’s warm.”  
  


“I’m sure,” Lu Han remarked. “You wouldn’t have fallen asleep naked that night if you hadn’t been ‘warm’ no matter how much you like the cold.”

 

“Shut up hyung,” I said.

 

“Anything else?”

 

“I just…kind of needed someone on those nights, alright hyung?” I needed Chanyeol when I remembered the one person I had needed for the past six years was going to be taken away from me.

 

“It sounds like you like Chanyeol more than a little,” Lu Han teased and stood up gathering our trash.

 

 I needed him.

 

**형**

 

I regretted asking Chanyeol to accompany me out. We were just going to walk the streets and wander into whatever shops caught our eye, but it was too cold and we spent most our time huddled in the corner of whatever shop looked the warmest. Chanyeol had finally donned a coat and he wore a cap over his flattened hair. I was decked out in gloves, colorful scarf, and beanie, all gifts of Lu Han that morning as I made my way out of the apartment to meet Chanyeol at the bus stop I parted with Kai at.

 

Lu Han called it a date. I refused to admit it.

 

We were in a cosmetic shop and the ladies that worked there kept coming up to us asking if we needed help as we huddled in front of the unisex section. They would initially reach out fair soft hands to Chanyeol, but he would smile at them and the attractive crookedness of the expression tended to put most of them off and they would turn to me instead. They wanted to know why my face was so fair, why my face was so smooth. I wanted to throw the bottle of moisturizer Chanyeol seemed intent on reading all the way through at them and tell them it was because I had great sex with the tall guy beside me and they were all ugly because they weren’t getting any and they weren’t getting any because they didn’t know what a beautiful smile was.

 

Of course, I didn’t actually say that. The girls weren’t actually ugly, and it would have brought up the issue of me being gay, and then that would have brought up the issue of me finding Chanyeol beautiful. Also, the reason why I knew sex was good for your skin was embarrassing.

 

We’d still only had sex twice anyways. Wasn’t it three times before you were defaulted into being in some form of a relationship with the person?

 

And this was definitely not a date. If it was, that would default Chanyeol and I as dating.

 

“Sehun, I think I’m getting this,” Chanyeol said and waved the bottle at me.

 

I came out of my thoughts and looked at the orange bottle, then up at his face. I couldn’t really see it very well because of the cap. I had to keep myself from ripping it off his head. “Yeah, I think that’s a good one.”

 

We went to the register and paid then prepared ourselves to meet the cold of late December. New Years was just around the corner now. Chanyeol’s shoulder brushed against mine before settling there. Heat seeped from his coat into mine and I pressed back, burying my face in my scarf more, covering the parts of my face that were still vulnerable to the winter chill with my mitten covered hands.

 

“Where do you want to go?” Chanyeol asked.

 

“I don’t know. Some place warm would be nice.” I peaked through my gloves and some what looked to be cartoon steam lifting up from a cinnamon bun. I could feel my mouth watering and my body aching for the warm a hot cinnamon bun promised. “You hungry hyung?”

 

I didn’t let Chanyeol answer. I just removed my hands from my face and grabbed his, pulling him into the café where the bun picture had been and headed straight for the display counter.

 

“Why yes, Sehun, I am hungry,” Chanyeol said with a laugh as he bent his tall frame to get a better look at the displayed food, too.

 

I gave him a sheepish glance and dug in my pocket, pulling out my wallet. “I’ll pay hyung, pick anything.”

 

“But I’m the hyung.”

 

“Yeah, but I’m the one that asked you out,” I said poking the glass where the cinnamon buns were.

 

“Okay,” Chanyeol responded. I could see his reflection in the glass, slightly pink with a small content smile on his lips. I smiled a bit, too.

 

“Hey, Sehun~~,” someone called.

 

I turned around to see who it was and cringed seeing Lu Han’s friend, Yixing, hanging off Tao’s arm. He waved at us and Tao pulled him in our direction.

 

“What are you two doing?” Yixing asked as he stared at me with curious eyes.

 

“We’re just hanging out,” Chanyeol answered.

 

“See, I told you they were on a date,” Tao said. “We should leave them be.”

 

Yixing turned toward Tao and patted his black mop of hair. I could see the tell tale signs of a second group of bite marks peaking over his neck at this angle.

 

“We’re not on a date,” I said.

 

I could feel Chanyeol looking at me. I glanced his way and he nodded at me before addressing his brother and Yixing. “We’re not on a date.”

 

Yixing shrugged. “We’re not on a date either then. Zitao, do you want cake?”

 

Their attention immediately went to the display case and I pushed Chanyeol to the register to order while they were busy discussing which creams tasted better between which layers and I didn’t want to listen anymore encase they weren’t talking about cake.

 

Somehow we still ended up eating across from Tao and Yixing. There had only been one opened table when we got our food, and it was too cold to escape outside. They had just sat down with us. I curled up in the corner of the booth Chanyeol and I shared trying to be as far away from the flirting Tao and Yixing in front of us as they shared three different slices of cake. Chanyeol’s long leg still managed to press against mine though. It was warm and it didn’t help my mood having to spend any part of my day out with Chanyeol with my brother’s friend.

 

I twirled a spoon around in my hot chocolate, my cinnamon bun left untouched. My other hand lay lazily across my lap. I jumped when I felt something warm slide across it. I looked down and saw Chanyeol’s hand lying on top of mine. It barely covered the tips of my fingers. I swallowed hard before flipping my hand palm up and letting Chanyeol’s fingers slide down to entwine with mine and I gave his hand a tight squeeze. Chanyeol chuckled to himself and leaned forward beginning to talk to Tao. I started eating my cinnamon bun.

 

We left the table a little while later, Chanyeol’s hand slide away from mine as he stood and I stuffed my hands into my pockets. Outside we walked closed together, Tao and Yixing trailing behind us. We started to get closer to the clubbing district. It was mostly empty, too early for any real club life in any of the ones that might be opened. I didn’t really want to go to one anyways.

 

When Chanyeol’s warmth left me, I stopped walking and turned to see him frozen in step. He slowly pivoted and his eyes met Tao’s, who was in much of the same state, Yixing pulling on his arm. Tao dragged Yixing until they stood in front of Chanyeol. I moved closer as well.

 

“Someone’s here. Is it the same as what you felt last time?” Chanyeol asked Tao.

 

Tao shook his head. “No, these are different people. The other was just one person and I feel him around a lot.”

 

“We should get out of here then,” Chanyeol said.

 

“What’s going on?” Yixing asked.

 

For the first time I wondered if Tao had told Yixing about what he was, who he was. Had Lu Han?

 

Tao turned to Yixing and cupped his face before kissing him hard. “We have to get out of here. I’ll explain when we’re safe.”

 

“Chanyeol?” I asked.

 

He turned to me and grabbed my hand. “There should be taxis waiting around the corner. Take one home.”

 

“You’re not coming with me?”

 

Chanyeol shook his head. “I’m going to lead them off. They’re less likely to attack one monster, particularly a simple phoenix. I might be strong, but I don’t pose much of a threat for humans. Tao can get away just fine, but you have the smell of monsters all over you. Quickly, go.”

 

I looked down the road where the taxis were and then back at Chanyeol. I grabbed the back of his head and pulled him down for a quick kiss. “You better come see me tomorrow.”

 

He smiled at me and patted my hair. “I’ll be fine, just go home, okay?”

 

I turned and started for the taxis. I wanted to stay and be stubborn, but something was telling me going home was what I needed to do.

 

**형**

 

The taxi driver threatened to kick me out of the car if I didn’t quit telling him to hurry up. I frowned and stared out the window as we drove through Korean traffic. I didn’t expect to see Lu Han strolling down the shops two blocks away from our apartment and I opened the door causing the taxi driver to curse at me as he came to a quick stop, the cars behind us blaring their horns. I ran over to my brother. Lu Han looked the temporary traffic jam with wide eyes then at me.

 

“Sehun, what in the world where you doing? Don’t just go jumping out of cars like that,” he reprimanded.

 

I bent over heaving and held out a hand toward him as I tried to catch my breath.

 

Lu Han just continued to berate me with questions. “Why are you here anyways? I though you were on a date with Chanyeol.”

 

I shook my head and stood up. “We ran into Tao and Yixing. Hyung, where are you going? You shouldn’t be out right now.”

 

“I went to the grocery store to get ingredients for Kai to cook us a romantic meal and I can leave the apartment when I want, I’m the adult after all.”

 

“We met Tao and Yixing.”

 

“Yeah, you already said that.”

 

I took a big gasping breath. “Then we ran into other monsters.”

 

Lu Han’s wide eyes now showed fear. He clutched the shopping bags dangling from his hands tighter. “Where are the others?”

 

“Tao took Yixing away before they got too close to us.”

 

“And Chanyeol?”

 

“He was going to lead them off.”

 

“And you just left him there to be the bait!” Lu Han yelled.

 

“Hey, I came here to make sure you were okay. There wasn’t anything I could do, I’m a human, remember,” I said gritting my teeth at him.

 

Lu Han stepped back from me, taken aback. “Hu…man…” I caught a glimpse of the sadness filling his eyes before he turned away from me. “I’m sure Chanyeol will be fine, let’s head back to the apartment. Kai’s supposed to come over later so he can tell us about it.”

 

I followed Lu Han headed to the apartment. We rounded a corner and walked passed a fenced up alleyway. Just as we passed, the wood splintered and smoke burst from down it. There were screams and people started running around. I could hear police sirens in the background and I coughed as the gray smoke wafted toward us.

 

“They’re here,” Lu Han said. I turned toward him and he dropped the grocery bags.

 

“Hyung…you can smell them?”

 

Never before had a monster’s eyes scared me, but Lu Han’s soft brown ones pooling into a pitch black set every nerve in my body on edge. I wanted to run, but I didn’t know if it was because of my brother or the other eyes I could feel boring into my back. I turned and saw figured emerging from the alleyway. Their angles were odd, shifting. I wanted to know if one of them was Chanyeol, but Lu Han grabbed my hand and we ran.

 

I held Lu Han’s hand tight. It felt colder than it use to and he ran faster than before, my feet tripping over themselves to keep up. I could feel the other monsters still following us. Lu Han kept chanting that he could smell them. They smelt like salt and fish, like island fruits. I could only smell snow and road tar and the faint trace of the cinnamon bun I had bought at the café with Chanyeol.

 

Something came flying past us and burnt a hole in the ground just inches from Lu Han’s next step. I looked around to see if any of the other passerbys had seen it, but their gaze was just the annoyed look of having to get out of the way of two running youths. I peaked over Lu Han’s shoulder and saw him lift a hand, small bit of gravel levitating a few inches above it before fall back into his hand. He growled and threw the rumble back on the side walk as we turned the last corner before our apartment building.

 

“Hyung?”

 

Lu Han turned his black eyes on me and smiled. “Don’t mind it for now, Sehun.”

 

I could only nod. The black eyes on my brother were weird, but the smile was still the same, the one he always used to comfort me when he wasn’t even comforted himself.

 

I turned my head and didn’t catch a hint of the other monsters. Lu Han slowed his steps and I figured he didn’t smell them either. We walked through the apartment lobby to the elevators, hands still clasped together. And old lady joined us in the elevator as it ascended. She didn’t seem to find our out of breath state, hands clasped tight, weird. She just commented on how ‘children had so much energy to be running around’ and smiled. I wondered if she was loosing her eyesight not to see my brother’s black eyes.

 

“Why are your eyes like that, hyung?” I asked when we got off the elevator.

 

“I was changed, Sehun. They’ve been doing this for a while.”

 

I knew that, but I hadn’t seen them. “Do they usually stay like that this long?”

 

Lu Han pulled out his key from his pocket and fumbled with it in the lock only using one hand. “It usually goes away after a minute or two. It’s only been like this before if I’m with Kai. I guess they stay longer when I’m under extreme emotional pressure.”

 

I never knew sex was an extreme emotional pressure. I didn’t comment on it as the door clicked open and Lu Han pushed it opened. I walked in first and broke the contact of our hands.

 

The air in the apartment was still and stuffy. I pulled off my coat and started for the stairs. “It’s hot in here, hyung.”

 

Lu Han walked to the heater to adjust it. “It smells off in here.”

 

“How long have you been able to smell like a monster?” I asked waiting on the bottom step for him.

 

“Right then, maybe since I went out, it wasn’t as obvious then. No, but it smells stronger, something in here smells stronger. It’s familiar, but I don’t know what it is.”

 

“Maybe you’re just smelling our apartment for the first time how it actually is. Two young men do live here, hyung.”

 

“One young man and a boy you mean,” Lu Han joked and started to pass the bathroom. A towel suddenly shot out and covered Lu Han’s face. Arms followed it and dragged Lu Han into the bathroom.

 

“Hyung!” I ran into the bathroom after my brother only getting a glimpse at its third occupant before getting a towel thrown over my face as well.

 

It was sprinkled in chloroform.

 

I felt myself hit the ground and that was it.

 


	17. In Which I Wake Up

**Chapter 17 – In Which I Wake Up**

 

 

The sound of shoes running across carpet had always annoyed me. Why would you run in shoes in a house? And I knew they were shoes, there was a definite difference in the pounding sound that vibrated through the floor. I often fell asleep in Lu Han’s room when he first moved in, spending long nights in there asking him millions of questions about China. I’d fall asleep on the rug in front of his bed and wake up to the sound of my father running from my room to Lu Han’s to see if I was there. Sometimes we would fall asleep in the middle of the day when our parents were still at work, both on the carpet; and Dada would come home to a quiet house. I never understood why he was afraid I’d disappear.

 

The sound stopped a few seconds after it started and I felt eyes staring down at me. I wasn’t pretty when I slept; they needed to go watch Lu Han sleep if they were going to be creepy stalkers. A hand landed on my head and pushed my bangs away from my eyes. The hand carried the scent of smoke and I scrunched my face in and tried to breath through my mouth so I wouldn’t have to smell it. I only ended up coughing.

 

I sat up, my lungs feeling dry, nose abused and looked around. Chanyeol and Kai were crouched down beside me. Chanyeol’s hand retracted and settled in his lap and he smiled a bit at me. Gray dust tinted his skin. I turned to Kai. His eyebrows were furrowed and he looked at me impatiently as if counting every second in his head.

 

My coughing stopped and I took a big breath to steady myself. I could feel my limbs tense up as they began to remember the events before the blackness first and then my mind filled in the memories.

 

“Where’s Lu Han?” Kai asked.

 

“Someone took him,” I said and stood up. I moved my knee wrong in my wakening state and started to fall to the side. Chanyeol steadied me.

 

“Who took him?”

 

“I just got a general outline before I got a towel thrown over my head. They had black hair. Can’t you smell them?”

 

Kai shook his head. “I don’t smell anything in here that I don’t usually smell except the chloroform.”

 

“Lu Han said he could smell it. How long was I out?”

 

Kai had his phone out, his thumb working quickly over the letters. “Thirty minutes, it wasn’t long. Chanyeol called me so I teleported here.”

 

I looked over at Chanyeol. “Are you okay?”  
  


Chanyeol shrugged. “I’m phone, just a little roughed up. One of the monsters had an explosion power, but they stopped at the end of your street.”

 

“They can’t really follow us into a huge apartment, can they?”

 

Chanyeol’s large hands started patting down my hair. I wanted to tell him to stop because his hands smelled like smoke and he was probably making my hair worse with his dirty hands, but he reminded me of a mother bird trying to groom its child’s ruffled feathers. I thought it was cute, so I let him.

 

“So, when are the others getting here so we head out and rescue my brother?”

 

Kai looked up from his phone looking a bit surprised before smiling. “I was wondering why you hadn’t gone into hysterics yet.”

 

“I was wondering the same about you. You have a plan, right?”

 

“I have ideas that will eventually result in a plan,” Kai explained. “Tao just dropped Yixing off at his apartment and Kyungsoo’s going over there to watch him while the rest come here. We’re going to have Tao sniff out the apartment, see if anything’s familiar to him, and then we’ll just follow the trail. And Chanyeol, would you stop messing with Sehun’s hair like that. He looks ridiculous and I’m trying not to remember that you’re sleeping with him.”

 

Chanyeol looked at me sheepishly then took a step back grinning at Kai.

 

Kai rolled his eyes and moved to the door, opening it. Tao, Baekhyun, Kris, Suho, and Kai’s parents stood outside. Kai’s ‘mother’, Taemin, moved over to me and looked at me curiously.

 

“You’re okay, right?”

 

I nodded still feeling awkward around the two older vampires. Minho and Tao walked around the apartment, the younger monster sniffing around. I wasn’t sure what Minho was doing, just staring at things with a burning glare.

 

“I know this smell,” Tao said.

 

“Is it the one you’ve been smelling?” Kris asked.

 

“Yeah, the smell from around Yixing’s apartment; I’ve never been here, but there’s a faint trace of it in the other rooms, the newer trace just goes from the door to the bathroom. I couldn’t really smell it outside because it mixed in too well with the snow. I can smell it now, though.”

 

“I can help you try and distinguish it,” Suho offered. “Tell me what it’s like when we get outside.”

 

They all started to walk for the door. I moved to grab my jacket, but Kai’s ‘father’ grabbed my wrist.

 

“I’m sorry Sehun, but we can’t risk bringing a human along if a fight breaks out,” he said.

 

I looked at my wrist in Minho’s grip then around the room, my eyes meeting Kai’s. I saw something flash over this eyes. He understood, Lu Han was his lover and Lu Han was my brother. Perhaps we didn’t love him in the same way, but there was a part of our love that was the same. He had never considered going after Lu Han without me.

 

Kai took my wrist in his hand, pulling it away from Minho.

 

“Dad, he’s coming.”

 

“And who will take responsibility for him?” Minho asked.

 

Chanyeol stepped forward, placing his hand on top of Kai’s on my wrist. “I will.”

 

Taemin moved and grabbed his lover’s arm pulling in to the front of the group. “Alright, since Chanyeol bit him, he can take responsibility for him. We’re going now.”

 

Kai’s hand slipped away letting Chanyeol’s to take hold of my hand. We followed at the end of the group, long fingers sliding in between mine as we walked and it wasn’t until I felt Chanyeol’s steady pulse running through his fingers against my own that I realized I was shaking. I held tight to Chanyeol’s hand, trying to match his pulse as we walked. They didn’t seem to find the need to run, in a hurry but not in a rush. I didn’t really understand, and every time they stopped to analyze where they were, having quick arguments about why Lu Han had been taken that way, or why something smelled a certain way, I just wanted to Chanyeol at them and yell for them to keep moving. I supposed Chanyeol could sense that. He would squeeze my hand when my lips quivered with the need to yell and I would remember that, for one, Chanyeol was probably too heavy for me to throw, and two, I wasn’t dealing with a human kidnapping. They were monsters and there were monster laws I didn’t know about.

 

My free hand moved to rub at the marks on my neck. I was only a third of what they were. Eventually, that much would fade as well.

 

**형**

 

We came upon a warehouse in one of the more abandoned parts of Seoul. It nestled between an apartment building in the works and an abandoned building with a closed pizza shop occupying the corner of it. Tao and Minho paced the front of the building before splitting to walk the perimeter. Kai’s father came back first and motioned us to the back. Chanyeol kept his hand out in front of me as if that worked as some sort of shield from me. I moved my hand to lie on his arm intending to push it away. I had to keep reminding myself I _was_ vulnerable in this situation that I probably couldn’t take care of myself if something happened. I hated it.

 

“Tao said he saw Lu Han,” Minho said when we had finally all made our way to the back.

 

Tao pointed in a window and I pushed past Chanyeol’s arm to try and peer inside with Kai. Our shoulder’s pushed at each other trying to get a glimpse at my brother. I could barely see his pale outline through the structures of rusted metal pipes and shelves. There was a platform with curl up bars like you might see in a gym. He was tied up on them like a human starfish, forehead resting on the top bar. I couldn’t see anyone else in the building.

 

“How are we going to save him?” I asked and turned around. I almost hand a heart attack and Kai had to cover my mouth with his hand to keep me from screaming.

 

In front of me stood seven monsters. Marks decorated each of their bodies. Horns of different styles and placement poked out of Minho’s, Kris’, and Tao’s heads, the two brothers had added scales on their body and scaly wizard tails. Dark bat like wings twitched behind Kai’s father’s back and a thin leathery tail wrapped around Taemin’s arm pulling him close to his lover. Kai’s mother had wings as well, large white ones. His hair was longer, and other than the marks, he didn’t look much different – definitely not what I imagined a vampire to be. I tried not to stare at Suho for too long. The fish like scales that crested his neck and the long shape of his mouth where sharp shark like teeth poked out when he smiled creeped me out. Baekhyun and Chanyeol only stood with their marks covering their bodies. I supposed fire and light weren’t powers you couldn’t have covering your body all the time.

 

Slowly, Kai removed his hand from his mouth. He placed a finger to his lips looking at me before he glanced at his parents.

 

“So he is a monster then?” Kai asked.

 

Tao nodded. “I said so since before. I think he’s a rogue…I kind of remember this smell though now that I’ve been following it.”

 

“I remember it,” Kris said.

 

Everyone turned to him and an understanding I couldn’t comprehend washed over them.

 

“Why did you guys change like this?” I asked finally.

 

Taemin smiled at me and I could see the dangerously long fangs poke out of his mouth. “Kidnapping a ‘bride’ of a monster is bad enough, more so when it comes to a royal’s ‘bride’. However, since it’s a rogue, and I understand that we seem to know this particular rogue, we have to appear before them as we are in order to gain thrust in speaking with them. As it seems, this might be a misunderstanding of sorts or a way of getting our attention. Since we’re invading his space we have to appear first.”

 

“So you guys aren’t going to fight or something?”

 

Taemin shrugged. “We’ll know if we need to fight. Don’t worry; you have Chanyeol there to protect you.”

 

Right, because I need the protecting.

 

“Stop reciting to him the rules of monster warfare or whatever and let’s go save my boyfriend already,” Kai said.

 

I looked at him just in time to see his body morph as well. Large black wings tore through his jacket, feathers ruffling as they settled. Horns poked out of his head…or where they ears? He had markings as well, but they only reached his chest and his nails were sharp and black. Looking at the others, I understood the difference between a fully developed monster and someone like Kai.

 

They all made their way to the front of the warehouse again. Chanyeol kept me in front of him, hands on my shoulders. I almost felt like I was the one leading him as every time I glanced back, his eyes were large and curious, almost nervous. His grip got tighter once we were inside and his head pressed into the back of my head as we darted around the metal structures that ended up being gym equipment.

 

We finally reached the platform where Lu Han was tied up. His eyes were closed, lips slightly parted. If it wasn’t for the shallow rise and fall of his chest I would have thought my brother dead. Kai rushed forward only to be pulled back by his mother, letting out a growl in frustration. Chanyeol’s hands were still tightly clamped on my shoulders, nails starting to dig into them and I understood not to attempt to finish Kai’s charge up to the stage.

 

“This isn’t a trap set by humans, Kai. The rogue should be around here somewhere,” Taemin explained.

 

A familiar laugh echoed through the warehouse. Shoes padding against hollow wood brought my attention back to the platform and I glared at the figure leaning against one of the shorter bars that my brother was tied up to. His eyes traveled along us before meeting mine and he smiled.

 

“Hello Sehun. I didn’t think they’d bring a human with them.”

 

“I didn’t think you would kidnap my brother, Xiumin hyung.”

 

Xiumin shrugged and pulled off the bar. He walked over to my brother and lightly tapped his face. The look he gave Lu Han as he did so was soft, apologetic and I couldn’t really understand why he had done it in the first place.

 

“I do what I have to. Wake up, Lu Han; your family is here to rescue you.”

 

Lu Han’s eyes blinked blurrily at us before widening as he thrashed against the bars. He growled, eyes going black, and I saw a mark starting to form on the side of his face, but it quickly retreated and he fell limp.

 

“Don’t hurt yourself, Lu Han. You’re not strong enough to fight me.”

 

My brother’s “Why?” was barely muttered over a whisper.

 

Again, Xiumin just shrugged. “There are reasons.”

 

“Minseok!”

 

Xiumin froze at the yell of his name. I was surprised by Kris’ outburst as well. We parted to give him room as he traveled to stand at the front of us.

 

“Minseok, please.”

 

Xiumin glanced behind him at Kris and grinned, looking back at Lu Han. “Wu Fan, this is not about past events. Don’t bring such things up right now.”

 

“You’re Lu Han’s friend,” Kai said and stood with Kris in the front. “Let him go.”

 

Xiumin turned and waved at Kai. “You’re his lover that he’s always going on about. I’ve known what you were since the beginning. Tao too. I would have been a better friend if I would have told them from the beginning what you were, but it still would have ended up like this, they’re stubborn and Sehun’s stubborn.”

 

“Let him go,” Kai repeated.

 

Xiumin shook his head and lifted a hand. The room suddenly felt colder. Chanyeol’s hands on my shoulders began to radiate heat into me as the air became like sheets of ice around us. I stared in awe as Xiumin began to change. The marking that covered his face reminded me of a skull and his hair turned an ice blue, frost covering his eyebrows and formed like jewels on his skin.

 

“So, here’s my answer, let’s fight.”

 

It all happened too quick for my eyes. Kai they waited until Kai launched himself first at Xiumin. He jumped, body long and powerful like a large cats and he swiped his claw like nails at Xiumin. My brother’s friend licked two fingers and through in the air. Kai’s fingernails scraped against ice and he rolled to the side. Xiumin jumped down from the platform and it was mayhem as he was ganged on by the rest. Light, water, and just pure animalistic strength pored down on him. Lu Han’s feeble attempts to get them to stop didn’t reach the riot on the floor, but it caught my attention and I saw Kai tearing the ropes that held my brother apart. I could still feel Chanyeol’s warm hands on my shoulders.

 

Kai helped Lu Han off stage. Lu Han took a quick glance at Kai, taking in his appearance before they shared a kiss and I looked away in time to see Xiumin throw Kai’s family off him, large blocks of ice shattering with the motion. A large chunk of the clear frozen water traveled straight at me, its sharp pointy end like the beak of a bird bulleting down for a deadly kill and I was but a mouse.

 

The warmth on my shoulders left.

 

Another bird swooped in its way.

 

Everything stopped. Xiumin’s marks faded away and he wiped himself down. “You’re marked as my adversary now.”

 

I stared at Chanyeol on the ground, body flickering with fire and red blood burning on the ground around him.

 

My hand reached down to touch Chanyeol’s face, the flames licked my skin before dying away on contact. He was sweating, biting his lip. I looked up at Xiumin and screamed.

 

**형**

 

A hand rested softly on my head pulling me from my day dreams. I opened my eyes and peeked up at my brother. He smiled down at me then his eyes moved to the face nestled against mine. I looked up and traced the edges of Chanyeol’s jaw with my eyes. He was asleep, the slight widening then shrinking of his nostrils telling me he was breathing. I sat up in the bed and wiped the back of my hands against my eyes scraping my skin with the crusted sleep. My eyes blinked blurrily around the room now free of the natural adhesive. Dim light seeped into the room from the window behind me and I could see the dust dancing in the sunlight.

 

“How’s he doing?” Lu Han asked.

 

I looked back down at Chanyeol. His chest was bare and a bandage covered his mid section. He argued he hadn’t needed the mending when we had arrived at Kai’s house after Xiumin’s declaration. I was in hysterics and tore through their bathrooms until I found a first aid kit and insisted someone bandage Chanyeol up even though he had stopped bleeding before we had even walked outside of the warehouse. Lu Han had eventually pulled me away and fixed my sloppy work on Chanyeol’s wound. They took him up to his room and I followed like a puppy, climbing into bed beside him. Chanyeol told them he wanted me to stay with him as he laid there sweating, gritting his teeth at the pain. He let me use his arm as a pillow and eventually we fell asleep.

 

I poked Chanyeol’s arm wondering if he could even feel it after having my head on it all night. “He’s breathing.”

 

Lu Han chuckled. “You’re very good at stating the obvious, Sehun.”

 

I laid my head on Chanyeol’s chest. His skin was a little too warm, but I could hear his steady heartbeat. “His heart’s beating, too.”

 

“Alright, let him sleep and come with me.”

 

I carefully climbed over Chanyeol and took my brother’s hand when he offered it to me.

 

“Is Xiumin still here?” I asked.

 

Lu Han nodded. “He and Kris spent the night talking, I don’t think he slept. Apparently they know each other, but Kai won’t tell me anything.”

 

“So we get to learn about it together?”

 

“It would seem so. Yixing’s here, too. Toa went and fetched him this morning. He’s not exactly taking all of this as well as me; we already had an argument because I didn’t warn him.”

 

“But he’s okay with it, right?” I asked.

 

Lu Han nodded. “He already agreed to stay with Tao. It’ll be nice to not go through this alone.”  
  


“Yeah, alone.”

 

 Lu Han pulled me downstairs. I could smell pancakes and maple syrup from the kitchen, the sound of sizzling batter and Kyungsoo’s humming in harmony with Suho’s. I didn’t really understand their cheerfulness, but I was happy to have someone not acting like any of this mattered. Their structureless melody was sort of hopeful.

 

 We entered the living room where Kai and the rest of his family were gathered. Baekhyun stood up when we entered and moved past me to head upstairs probably to sit with Chanyeol. I tried not to think about it too much, they were friends after all.

 

I saw Yixing sitting in the loveseat, Tao behind him with a hand comfortingly on his shoulder. I sat next to him, Lu Han taking his place sharing a single seater with Kai. Kai’s parents, Kris, and Xiumin occupied the big couch.

 

“Good morning, Sehun,” Xiumin greeted.

 

I didn’t greet back. I didn’t even look up at him.

 

“We’ll have Kris and Xiumin explain everything then,” Minho said.

 

“I want Xiumin to talk first,” Yixing piped up beside me. “I understand Lu Han keeping this all from me a little more than I understand you keeping it from the both of us. Sure, you didn’t have to say it before, but you should have said something when Lu Han and I started sleeping with them. Why didn’t you tell us they were monsters before it was too late?”

 

Xiumin sighed and I heard him shift back in his seat. “When a monster wants to create another monster, a rogue like me has no real say it in. I can’t just tell you because you’re my friends that your boyfriends are monsters. It’s their jobs to explain things to you. Also, I just didn’t want to deal with this particular group of monsters.”

 

“Then why did you fight them?” I asked. I watched Xiumin shift his feet, Kris’ feet moving seconds later as if they were trying not to touch.

 

“We’ll get to that in a second, Sehun,” Kris said. “There’s something more personal that needs to be addressed.”

 

“Why do they know you, Xiumin?” Lu Han asked.

 

I peaked up curiously and saw red cross both Xiumin and Kris’ cheeks, but it was off set by the sad looks in their eyes.  

 

“Sometimes people who belong together can’t be together,” Xiumin explained. “Kris and I were lovers before he was turned. My family was a Korean castaway posing as Chinese. There was a war and we were both part of it. We ranked high for our young ages and so had the freedom to sneak around. There was a monster war in the area at that time as well and there were many Asian oriented monster groups looking to recruit from the fighting groups. We were both chosen, but by different warring groups.”

 

“Taemin and Minho chose me,” Kris explained.

 

“He looked too promising to waste on war,” Taemin said. “I wanted a son, but it wasn’t a good time to raise monster children for royals so Minho agreed to change him for me.”

 

“We were royals still forming our groups so we could get around everyone else.”

 

“I planned to change Xiumin or to ask Minho and Taemin to change him for me after I had been changed,” Kris said.

 

“But,” Xiumin continued, “I had already been approached by a monster group that was fighting. I had the same intentions toward Kris, changing him. I thought it was that or I would have to watch him die in a human war. We had both already been changed when we approached each other about it. I couldn’t leave my group or they would go after Minho and Taemin and Kris couldn’t come to mine, I wouldn’t let him.”

 

“But you’re a rogue now,” Lu Han said.

 

“Yeah, I ended up being stronger than the rest of my group. The royals died in war and the rest just disappeared as the years went on until it was just me.”

 

“You can join us now, Minseok,” Kris said. “I’m not in Minho’s and Taemin’s group anymore, I have my own.”

 

Xiumin sighed. “Even during the war when we were humans we were going to end up split up leading our own groups. My group just happens to be an army of one.”

 

I rolled my eyes. Their story was sad but I couldn’t seem to find the proper form of sympathy for Xiumin. “It’s terrible, your guys’ past and all, but I just want to know why you kidnapped my brother and stabbed my boyfri—…Chanyeol.”

 

Xiumin smiled and I kind of wanted to punch one of his soft cheeks for the first time. “That’s the easy question. There was a group of monsters from Jeju Island visiting here for the winter. They’re not a large group, so they wouldn’t worry about a rogue like me, but your guy’s group is big and if they caught a whiff of Lu Han or Yixing and thought you guys were recruiting, they would make trouble which apparently they did. Since my friends were entering this group, and it’s Kris’ group, I didn’t want them to fight with you all so I had to mark you as my ‘prey’ so to speak. I’ve been here longer than both of you and with Lu Han and Yixing; I would have more of a reason to fight with you so the Jeju group would have to leave you alone.”

 

“What does that have to do with the kidnapping and stabbing?” I asked.

 

“I had to stage it to look real so the Jeju group wouldn’t get suspicious. Yixing was out, so I went for Lu Han instead. I knew you and Kai would come after him and then I just had to say my intentions were to fight you and I had to leave my mark.”

 

“Chanyeol?”

 

 “I’m sorry Sehun. I honestly didn’t know Chanyeol was the one you were sleeping with. I actually meant to mark Kris or Kai, but the ice just happened to go your way. Luckily he’s a phoenix so the ice melted before it could pierce his skin too far. I don’t regret doing it, though, especially now that I know Taemin and Minho were still visiting. The Jeju Island group would have definitely gotten scared knowing you were affiliated with two high class royals.”

 

I turned my head to the wall closest to the stairs. Chanyeol’s wound hadn’t been that deep; he said he just bled a lot, monsters just bled a lot. I had never seen so much blood before.

 

“So, what now?” I asked.

 

“And that’s the hard question,” Kris said.

 

“Well, first off, Taemin and I will leave,” Minho said. “We don’t want the Jeju group to know we’re here if they’re sticking around for a while.”

 

“Minseok’s mark with only last for a while and I don’t know what the Jeju monsters’ intentions are for visiting this area. We’ve caused too much commotion here, and with two new members, I think it’s time to relocate. Suho and I will prepare everything.”

 

“So, you’re leaving?” I turned my head and stared at my brother. His head was bowed and his hands held together in his lap. Kai placed his hand on top of Lu Han’s and turned to meet my eyes.

 


	18. And Then They Leave

**Chapter 18 – And Then They Leave**

 

 

Sometimes we had dance practice during vacation. Kai reminded me that the next day was one of those days. He and Lu Han stayed the night in Kris’ apartment and I took over Baekhyun’s bed (it felt strange being too close to Chanyeol after he woke up). The light incubus ran off to his lover’s house, I hadn’t seen him since.

 

I tugged on the end of my barrowed shirt. It was Chanyeol’s and a little too long for my liking. There were sweat stains soaked into it and I wondered if I should wash it before returning it or just throw it at him with all my sweat still perfuming it up along with the sweat pants. It wasn’t like Chanyeol was a pervert like my brother.

 

Kai finally ended his conversation with the teacher and we left the dance studio to head back to his house. The cold winter air felt good breezing by my sweat dried skin. I wanted to rip open the heavy coat I had on and toss it on one of the power lines to watch it catch fire and burn than dance and make snow angels in the snow in just my boxers. Kai was partially already there, his thinner jacket opened and hanging off one of his shoulders revealing the white tank top underneath and I wanted to gag when I saw the familiar symbol on the front.

 

“I would have thought you would’ve thrown that shirt away by now,” I said looking ahead of us as we started through town toward the subway.

 

“Hmm, oh my tank top? I could never throw this away, it’s special.”

 

I took a glance at Kai to see him grinning at me. I rolled my eyes.

 

“You’re a pervert, Kim Jongin.”

 

“Says the one who’s literally in my brother’s pants.”

 

I felt my cheeks grow warm and moved over to shove my shoulder against his. “Pervert.”

 

He chuckled and moved his hand behind his head to rest against as we walked.

 

It was silent again. I stuffed my hands deeper into my pockets and blew out puffs of cold air. My mouth formed ovals and squares in an attempt to make shapes, but all that came out were mini formless clouds.

 

“If you want to learn how to be a dragon I would suggest talking to Tao and Kris,” Kai said.

 

I turned to ask him what he meant but only got a snowball to my face. The movement of the crushed cold ice sliding down my still warm and sticky face felt good, but I could still feel the sting from the initial impact. I only stayed frozen long enough to get a sense of enjoyment of the cold before I rushed at Kai. He made a low squeaky noise before he started to run.

 

There weren’t many people on the sidewalks in this weather so we moved through them quickly. I bent down toward one of the many scraped up piles of snow on the sides of the walkway and gathered a ball of snow throwing it at Kai a few yards ahead. It fell short and he took a turn. I rushed after him, a second snowball in my hand. I caught a glimpse of Kai just as he jumped over a fence and ran into the playground of an elementary school.

 

“Hurry up Sehun,” he called, waving from by the slide.

 

I walked up to the fence and tried to throw the snowball over it. It flew high, but barely made it over the metal chain link in a steep slope down. I curled my fingers around the silver holes and started to climb up the fence.

 

Kai sat at the bottom of the slide and grinned at me as I landed a little shaky. I wiped myself off and went to the back of the slid, climbing up it and sat at the top. With my legs stretched out, I could almost touch the top of Kai’s shoulders. He turned and straddled the slide facing me. He rested his elbows on his thighs and cradled his head in his hands. His smile was beginning to annoy me.

 

“Why are we in a playground, Kai?”

 

“To play, what else do you do in a playground?” He kept smiling.

 

I gritted my teeth and brought my knees up so I was in a ball at the top of the slide. All I had to do was shift my weight forward and gravity pulled me down toward Kai. He started to sputter a protest, but my body hit his and we fell toward the snow. I lifted myself off Kai and he glared up at me before disappearing.

 

“Eat snow, Oh Sehun!”

 

I felt a hand grab my shoulder and turn me on my back. Kai straddled me and started stuffing snow into my face and hair. I clawed at his shirt to get him to stop. Finally I just reached above me and smashed a handful of snow into his face. It was weird to see Kai’s face dusted in white. The pale flakes stood out against his light gold skin and I wished I could reach my cellphone right then to snap a picture to send to Lu Han. I thought my brother would have found the sight beautiful. I just found it funny and started to laugh.

 

Kai laughed too and moved off me. He held his hand out for mine and dragged me over to the swings. I traced lines in the snow with my shoes as Kai swung back and forth, the clank of the chains growing louder the higher he went.

 

“You cheated,” I said.

 

Snow sprayed out from under Kai’s feet as he came to a sudden halt.

 

“You teleported.”

 

“Sehun.”

 

I stopped drawing in the snow and looked at Kai. His eyes were set in a hard serious stare. I combed the snow out of my bangs so I wouldn’t have to look at him as he started talking.

 

“We’re leaving before school ends.”

 

My fingers stilled in my hair. I stared at my pale wrist for a second before letting it fall with a sigh. “You’re not going to finish the year up here then?”

 

Kai shook his head. “No, we’re going to go to America. Kris had already been offered a transfer there from work before Christmas. He had until next week to decide. It’s a good excuse to tell the school.”

 

“That’s what you were telling the teacher about?” I asked.

 

“Yeah, that I was moving and wouldn’t be in the end of the year performance.”

 

“What about Lu Han?”

 

“He said he was going to come up with an excuse to take his exams early. He was going to talk to his university; we’re still coming up with a reason for him to leave.”

 

“But you’re definitely leaving before the new school year?” I asked.

 

Kai nodded his head. “I’m sorry, Sehun. I’m probably the worse friend you’ll ever encounter.”

 

“Why do you say that?”

 

Kai shook his hair as well, a few snow flakes that hadn’t melted falling from his dark hair onto his lap. “I just kind of danced into your life forced you to be friends and then stole your brother from you.”

 

“I don’t think asking someone to date their older brother counts as stealing. We weren’t in some incestial relationship, Kai.”

 

“That’s true. You steal boyfriends from their significant others, not their brothers. Still, are you going to be okay like this?”

 

I leaned back in the swing. “Well you’re leaving. Lu Han’s leaving. Chanyeol’s leaving, Kyungsoo’s cooking is leaving. Now that I think about it, so is Yixing’s cooking. You guys really are taking everything away from me.”

 

“Sehun,” Kai whined.

 

I buried the tips of my shoes in the snow and pushed myself back and forth a bit as I stared up at the ice gray sky. “No, I won’t be okay. My brother means everything to me…and…if he’s happy…then loosing all of that for however long is okay.”

 

Kai chuckled. “I didn’t think I’d get to hear you say something like that before we left. It’s almost like you’re being understanding.”

 

I glared at Kai. “I’m a good brother, but maybe not a good friend. I should thank you for some things, though.”

 

“Like what? I don’t think I’ve really given you anything.”

 

“You gave me a friend to get mad at, to fight with, a brother of the same age. You gave me Chanyeol for a while. You gave me food.”

 

“Kyungsoo gave you food,” Kai corrected.

 

“Originally it came from your lunch box, but that’s not the point.” I sat up in the swing. “I guess I can give you Lu Han for all of that.”

 

“I didn’t think you could give me your brother. You said I couldn’t steal him from you.”

 

“Stealing and giving are two different things. And it’s like at a wedding where the father gives the bride away to the groom except Lu Han doesn’t have a father so it’s up to me.”

 

“Oh, I see. So we’re cool now or something?” Kai asked.

 

“Or something,” I said as I reached down and scooped up a pile of snow. I threw it at Kai’s chest covering the black symbol on his tank top.

 

He just stared at me and smirked. I laughed. I wished there had been more times I laughed with Kai.

 

**형**

 

I always despised the last day of vacation. I felt like I had to do something because it was the last day before I was swamped with school again, but I had already finished any personal project I had (I didn’t have any projects, I read manhwa) and Kai said he was busy packing and I just couldn’t bring myself to call Chanyeol. On the last day of vacations I always ended up in front of the television aimlessly watching the figures that popped up on the screen.

 

But, Lu Han was here.

 

Lu Han always made plans on the last day with his friends, but there he was dressed in his pajama pants and a t-shirt leaning against the kitchen doorframe waving a movie in his hand.

 

“Let’s watch a movie together, Sehun, we haven’t done that since Christmas Eve.”

 

I blinked at him in answer. Lu Han smiled and went to the television, switching channels and untangled the DVD wires from the game system’s wires to switch them out.

 

“How about you go get snacks, Sehun.”

 

I stood from the couch and went to the fridge, scavenging the remainders of Christmas foods that Yixing, Kyungsoo, and Xiumin had presented us. I found spicey rice cakes, brownies, two left over steamed buns and put them on a tray along with a bowl of chips and milk and walked out. Lu Han was already seated on the couch, his legs pulled up on the couch with a fleece thrown over them, nibbling on the tips of his fingers (a habit I guessed he picked up from Kai) as he watched the trailers. I set the tray down on the coffee table and my brother uncurled himself and sipped the milk getting some of the white bubbles on his upper lip like a mustache. I handed him a napkin.

 

“Thanks,” he said and settled back.

 

I sat and turned my attention to the television. The movie had finally started, tiger cubs frolicking in the forest. Then the movie title popped up on the screen and I narrowed my eyes and slowly turned my head to my brother.

 

“You’re not very subtle, are you, hyung?”

 

Lu Han grinned at me sheepishly. “It was either this or jgv.”

 

“I’m not watching jgv with you again, that was only one time.”

 

Lu Han shrugged. “We can shut it off if you want.”

 

“No, let’s watch it,” I said and leaned forward, picking up the DVD case from the coffee table. _Two Brothers_.

 

Occasionally, I took glances at my brother. The tiger cubs, the main characters, didn’t talk so it left me with times of boredom. Lu Han seemed enthralled by it. He had stopped nibbling on his fingers and just rested his head on his knees, eyes going wide at certain scenes and small lips expressing his excitement in ‘o’s and pouts. I grinned a little. It was nice when Lu Han was having fun. It was nice when he could just pretend to be a normal kid even if he was technically in his twenties. Lu Han’s eyes went black during one of the harsh scenes when they abused the tigers and I remembered Lu Han wasn’t normal. He had never been normal.

 

I wondered if my efforts to be a good younger brother to Lu Han were just a pacifier. I use to think as long as I could make him feel comfortable he would be happy. I remembered the first time I saw my brother being bullied. They had shoved him on the ground, their frames much larger than his and his cheek was bruised and lip split, but he still radiated a heartbreaking purity. (When he brought home an Art History book in his first year of college, I had pointed out one of the pictures of a martyred Saint and told him it reminded me of him on that day.) And then they called him a monster. They spit on the ground by him and called him a monster, told him to go back to China, said bad things about his father. When I saw tears in Lu Han’s eyes, I ran forward and planted fists half their size into the bullies’ hard bodies screaming at them. It was only because they knew who I was, who _my_ father was, that they didn’t fight back. It wasn’t because I was a berserk rapid elementary school kid like Lu Han often said lisping out things through my retainer. I protected him, loved him, but I remembered that day too often. I remembered the vulnerable parts of my brother too much. He was my _hyung_. And I needed to think about _that_ , about what he had to bottle up inside so that I wouldn’t see him bullied again, so that I wouldn’t see him cry, so that _I_ could cry on _his_ shoulder when our mother left.

 

And I never thought of those things before. I was just a pacifier for his comfort, just enough to keep him from breaking down in tears.

 

The movie ended and I looked at Lu Han, tears streaming down his face as he looked back at me and I realized, no matter how many times it looked like he might cry, Lu Han hadn’t shed a tear of sadness in front of me since that girl took his first kiss on our front porch.

 

“I’m sorry Sehun,” Lu Han said. His body shook as he began to sob.

 

I reached out for him, but I didn’t really know what to do. It had been so long since I last saw my brother do anything more than tear up. He was breaking down and I didn’t understand why.

 

“I’m leaving. I’m going to leave you all alone so I can go after my own happiness. I’m just like mom, I’m so sorry.”

 

I frowned. “No hyung, you’re not like Mom. Why are you crying? Do you not want to go anymore?”

 

Lu Han shook his head. “I want to go, I love Kai. There isn’t really any turning back. We shouldn’t have watched that movie.”

 

I scooted closer to my brother on the couch and placed a hand on his shoulder. “We need to talk about this, hyung.”

 

“You go first…I…I need to listen to you, Sehun. I’ve been refusing, so you talk,” Lu Han said and wiped his face with the fleece.

 

After so many months of yelling at my brother in order to get him to hear my complaints and being shut off I couldn’t really find anything to complain about. Why had I been so angry for so long? Because I didn’t want my brother to be taken from me.

 

“I don’t want you to go hyung.”

 

“I have to, Sehun.”

 

“I know you do. I’ve known it since the beginning. I’m just so afraid of you leaving me since mom did and…” I paused. I came home earlier than Lu Han in those days, pretty early for a Korean student. I was only a middle schooler. I came just as our mother walked out the door with a three suitcases in hand. She smiled at me and handed me a note to give to my father. All she said was bye and placed a kiss on my cheek. I didn’t even realize there was a taxi there until she had already climbed in it. I watched our mother leave without trying to stop her. Maybe it was because of how she was dressed, in a business suit, hair washed and pinned up, that I didn’t think of it as weird until she was actually gone. And then I walked inside and curled up on the couch silent until Lu Han and my dad got home. “I just needed to try and stop you, Lu Han. I didn’t stop mom.”

 

Lu Han ruffled my hair, eyes still wet, but he smiled reassuringly like the big brother he was. “You couldn’t have stopped her if you tried. You may have seen something you didn’t want to if you did. Thank you for trying to stop me, though, Sehun. Because of you I know for certain this is what I want. I want to be with Kai and be part of their world.”

 

I was the sacrifice he would have to make for that. Lu Han wasn’t the type that could live off the acceptance of just one person (Yixing and Xiumin couldn’t count; they were both just like him now). He was probably a lot closer to breaking than I thought, like the china figurines in my room. Kai once said he and I were kindred spirits. I understood that now; we both needed Lu Han, but my need for him was lessoning, and my brother was right that eventually I would be okay. I had lived ten years only knowing I had a brother and not knowing how he was doing, I could spend fifty easily knowing he was loved.

 

I moved my hand from Lu Han’s shoulder and cupped his face. I leaned down and pressed my lips to his, like mom had pressed her lips to my cheek before she left, and tried not to cry as he pressed back and then pulled my head into the crook of his neck and held me like that day.

 

“I love you so much, hyung.”

 

“I love you, too, and even if you can’t see me, I’ll be watching over you.”

 

**형**

 

I missed my old seat. The second year classrooms were on the second floor of our school and class 2-C was on the opposite side of my class last year. Instead of the view of the tree at the front of the school, there was the view of the sports fields in the back which might have been an easy enough scene to get lost in watching, but it was always in shadow because of the position of the sun. And, anyways, I was all the way on the other side of the classroom staring at the paper covered sliding windows that looked into the hall when opened, second seat to the back as always, except their was a girl sitting behind me who kept staring at my face and laughing to her friend beside her in the back. It was only a month into the new school year and I already couldn’t find a reason to want to tolerate it.

 

Everyday I only looked forward to the last bell. And of course, dance class. I started to take the club more seriously. I stayed extra after school to work on our dances and some of my own personal projects, watching myself through the mirrors. I wanted to become that image I saw at the end of summer, become the Monster of Music, embody it. The club president asked me to take over when he resigned to focus on his third year studies. I accepted. I needed something to dedicate myself to, something to fill my obsessive void.

 

The living room in the apartment was now filled with the figurines I kept in my room and I made sure there was always a vase of white roses on the coffee table. My dad came to visit once, for my birthday. He spilled some speech explaining his sentiments for me having to be alone now and how he wished he could stay with me. I knew he really wished he could, but he never once looked me in the eye when he talked. What we resembled of each other we also resembled of our mother and that was why he had left us alone. I had had the small hope that I could live with my dad again, but seeing him struggle just to look at me proved that we couldn’t. He wasn’t as strong as he seemed, he was breaking inside, and to that respect Lu Han resembled him.

 

Xiumin practically lived there on the weekends, though. He brought large portions of food and stuffed it in the fridge for me to eat throughout the week. We didn’t talk much. I suppose he thought as my brother’s friend he had the responsibility to watch over me. Or maybe he was trying to make up to me what he had done that night even if everything had worked itself out to some extent.

 

So, I came home hours past dinner time on a mid-spring night just like I had done every other night since the apartment had become solely mine. Xiumin was there, I could hear him in the kitchen as I slipped off my shoes. I took a glance inside to see a dinner sat out covered with plastic rap and a box placed on the counter. I walked over to it and lifted the top with one finger, getting a glance on the cake inside it; words sprawled across the top then let it fall back down with disinterest.

 

“You should go take a shower than come eat something and we’ll cut the cake,” Xiumin said as he washed the dishes.

 

“I’m not really in the mood for cake.”

 

“Then you can eat it by yourself tomorrow.”

 

I took one last glance at the cake box before I headed upstairs. Lu Han’s door was closed; it had been that way for a while. I stopped going in there when school started up again, but I let Xiumin in because he cleaned the apartment. I grabbed a change of clothes and took a long hot shower. Xiumin was gone by the time I came out. I grabbed a cup of water and poured it into the vase of white roses, picking off the petals that were starting to turn brown. I took a couple spoonfuls of the food Xiumin had left out for me and put the rest in the fridge to use for my lunch at school and took the bubble tea I found in the fridge to the living room to drink while I watched television. I had decided not to do any homework assigned to me today; I just wanted to numb my mind with the pretty faces of idols on the variety shows and dramas that were on.

 

It was a quarter after eleven when my phone rang. I sat up confused by the “Baby, Baby, Baby, Oh~” playing from it. I had changed my ringtone, specifying it for certain people like my dad and Xiumin…and them. It stopped and started again and I finally reached out, looking at the name on the screen. Phoenix.

 

I hadn’t talked to Chanyeol since I left their house after he was shot. There was some kind of telekinetic understanding between us that we really shouldn’t even try to talk. I pressed the talk button and held the phone to my ear, licking my lips.

 

“Sehun?”

 

His voice was still the same baritone, maybe a little lower with sleep. I looked at the clock and tried to calculate what time it was in New York. “Chanyeol.”

 

There was silence for a few seconds and I counted his breath, my hand coming to rub my neck.

 

“Oh, um…Happy Birthday!”

 

I couldn’t help the grin that crossed my face when his voice went from unsure to loud and excited. I was seventeen. Kai had turned seventeen, too, just after he left. That was the last time I had talked to him, a quick call to him before he went to bed to sing him Happy Birthday. My brother’s birthday had passed, too. I texted him, but didn’t get anything back and wondered how many more birthdays he would get before they were just renewals.

 

“Thanks Chanyeol. I…uh…didn’t think anyone would call.”

 

“We’re not supposed to,” Chanyeol said and lowered his voice. “It’s sort of a thing not to have any contact with the people when we leave and you’re under Xiumin’s protection so it would look bad to those Jeju Island guys.”

 

I nodded understanding. They had explained this to me when they left. “Do you think…can I speak to my brother?”

 

“Lu Han…you see he hasn’t really been very human since his birthday. It only lasts for a few months, but it’s pretty nasty, this part of the transformation,” Chanyeol explained.

 

“Oh…what about Kai?”

 

“Can’t let you do that either. Kris would be able to read it that he had talked to you and then he would want to tell Lu Han about it. I’m not sure how Lu Han would take it while he’s like this.”

 

I frowned and almost wished he hadn’t called. I wanted to talk to my brother and my best friend.

 

“You know, Sehun,” Chanyeol started, “it’s not like this is forever. We kind of made it seem that way, but I mean, you should see Baekhyun.”

 

“What’s wrong with Baekhyun?”

 

“He’s just not satisfied with anyone. He’s been feeding less and less and Kris has to force him sometimes. Tao even got Yixing to agree to offer a threesome, but his heart is just not in it. I told him he was totally in love with that Jongdae guy.”

 

“What about you?” I asked.

 

Chanyeol sighed, his breath making a crinkling sound into the found. “I don’t help him feed anymore, Sehun.”

 

"Why not?"

 

He chuckled. “Why not, you’re just asking that aren’t you? It’s not like he’s the only one that wants to go back. Kris agreed to have us visit for your graduation next year; maybe Kai will join you on the stage or something.”

 

“Really?” A huge bundle of happiness dropped into my stomach and I felt sick thinking about it. I could see my brother again, and Kai, and Chanyeol?

 

“And, well, it wasn’t exactly an accident so I kind of need to come back for you and finish what I started.”

 

My eyes widened and I stopped rubbing my neck. The bruising of the teeth marks had basically disappeared, but there were still small dots where Chanyeol’s teeth had pressed harder into.

 

“I wasn’t going to do it because I didn’t know if you liked me or if I was just helping you, but you kissed me so I got a little excited and…yeah~ I’m going to take it as that’s okay to do, but not until you’re nineteen, and now I’m going to hang up. It…it was nice hearing your voice again, Sehun.”

 

“Shouldn’t I be the one saying that?” I laughed. “Yeah, thank you, Chanyeol.”

 

I could almost hear his smile before the connection was cut off. I sighed and flopped to the side on the couch, phone dangling over the edge. A few minutes later my phone chimed and I picked it up to see a picture message.

 

**From: Phoenix**

**To: Sehun**

**So since you gave me something worth so much on**

**my birthday I thought I should give you something back.**

**Happy Birthday Oh Sehun**.

 

Attached to the message was a picture of Chanyeol. His orange brown hair was all curled up like a poodle’s on the top of his head and he was grinning like a maniac holding up a peace sign at the camera. I thought it was kind of cute and chuckled, but my heart stopped when I looked into the background of the picture. It looked like a living room and on the couch sat two figures, one with dark hair looking toward the other who he had one arm wrapped around. The other figure sat with one hand clinging to the other’s shirt and looked toward the camera. My brother’s pale face was covered with markings, eyes pitch black and almost like a frightened animal's, but there was Kai beside him comforting him, probably whispering ‘I love you’s over and over again because there was just the slightest upturn of Lu Han’s mouth, a shadow of the smile that played across my own lips as I saved the picture.

 


End file.
